Global expansion strategies and market entry

European and Chinese Efforts at Global Expansion (1400-1600)

This work will examine the efforts of both the Europeans and the Chinese at global expansion during the period between 1400 and 1600. The work of Pikerman (2002) states that Europe, during the fifteenth century "began a process of unprecedented expansion that by 1650 had affected all areas of the world." The navigational technology developed in Eurasia, "along with expanding trade, encouraged long sea voyages by Arabs, Japanese, Chinese and Europeans. But only the Europeans linked up all the continents in a new global age, when sea power, rather than land-based armies was the main force in empire-building." (Pikerman, 2002)

EUROPEAN EXPANSION

The work of David Ringrose entitled: "Europeans Abroad, 1400-1700: Strangers in Not-so-Strange Lands" states that "...between the years of 1400 and 1700 thousands of Europeans took up residence all over the world - a process that prompts a series of rhetorical questions. Once the European galleons had disappeared over the horizon disease." (Ringrose, nd) Ringrose relates that four decades ago the phrase "European expansion evoked a pretty defined narrative. In that older, by 1500 CE the Spanish and Portuguese were pushing into the Atlantic in search of a route to the East and that would give them access to Asian luxuries and eliminate Italian and Middle Eastern middlemen." (Ringrose, nd) the Spaniards seized control of what they considered the most valuable parts of American, took away a great deal of silver, caused the death of most of the Indians, and filled much of the void with African slaves" (Ringrose, nd)

Ringrose relates that it is now known that the European expansion was driven by "empires...[that]...were fragile..." (Ringrose, nd) the European empire is compared by Ringrose with that of "the Ming Empire in China, the kings and princes of fifteenth and sixteenth-century Europe look more like the undisciplined provincial warlords than powerful rulers." (Ringrose, nd) the Europeans during this time viewed Latin Christianity as a "distinctive marker between themselves and other cultures." (Ringrose, nd) However, the concept of Europe during that time is stated by Ringrose to have been "striking." (Ringrose, nd) Ringrose points out the comments of Frank (1999) in the work entitled: "ReOrient" in which Frank "exemplifies the assumption that economic activity is the only important matrix for global history." (Ringrose, nd)

Frank reaffirms "established truisms about long-distance trade, namely that:

1) Everybody traded with somebody, and ultimately with everybody;

2) that Europe long was a small player in the global trade system and what role she acquired as due primarily to her ability to use American silver to subsidize her entry into world trade; and 3) that little Europe did economically, financially or technologically depended on techniques that were uniquely European." (Ringrose, nd)

Ringrose additionally states that by the year 1450 global contacts had accelerated causing globalization to create a huge growth in the "growing number of Europeans who became part of the global landscape in the three centuries after 1400." (nd) Sixteenth century Europe is stated to have "housed two distinct urban networks, one built around a cluster of cities in Mediterranean Europe, the other, centered on northwestern Europe." (nd) Ringrose states that in his study he examined 'urban networks' which "show up most easily through examination of patterns of trade." (nd) Trade, political matters and other activities that were long-distance in nature were all activities that "operated within structures that most participants took for granted... [and that being]...trade, cultural exchange and political life...[which]...were all channeled through cities and intercity networks." (Ringrose, nd)

The second types of networks are stated to be "interpersonal affinity networks" which were important to the Europeans in their venturing into the "the larger world around them" and then finding that they were "without the military and diplomatic backing implied by euro-centric narratives of the Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch and English 'empires' of 1400-1700." (Ringrose, nd) Ringrose notes the statement of: 'The business of making and maintaining [European] empire always involved dependence on non-whites and non-Christians, and not merely the experience of ruling them. This means we must try to make some attempt to grasp the attitudes and activities of Europeans abroad as they met other societies." (nd) the conception of Ringrose is one that was based upon "family, clan, and community allegiances. The links in such a network are stated to have resulted from "individual decisions and, in the aggregate, they constituted the inter-city transactions that, described collectively, allow us to identify urban networks." (nd)

II. GLOBAL EXPANSION of CHINA

Ringrose relates that the same process is observable in the history in Ming China. The community schools were only nominal providers of education and "were subverted by local elites in a predictable way." (nd) However, in sixteenth century China central authority was not nearly as overwhelming in affairs that were local resulting in these schools being transformed by elites into "academies that provided the training necessary to pass the Imperial Civil Service examination." (Ringrose, nd) Not only did bureaucracy become more acknowledging of local dynamics in communities but also resulting was the construction of "commercial and political urban networks...by family and community-based networks." (Ringrose, nd) Ringrose states that the support systems in Europe as well as the individuals that comprised these systems of support "began to extend their reach beyond Europe and the Mediterranean...after about 1400." (nd) This resulted in an interaction with the world around them. Ringrose states that the truth is that the European empires "of the sixteenth through eighteen centuries spread as much by collaboration as by conquest and force." (Ringrose, nd)

III. INTERACTIONS BETWEEN EUROPE and CHINA

The work of Harriet T. Zurndorfer entitled: "Cotton Textiles and Ming/Qing China in the Global Economy (1500-1840) states that the economy of Ming China during the period 1368 to 1644 "became an arena of competing commercial entrepots and specialized cash-cropping regions." (nd) Additionally stated is that during this period "...the interaction between the Chinese production of, and the European consumption of silks and porcelain was in full swing and that it would take at least another 200 years before the power of technology and the drug trade would shift this situation into other directions." (Zurndorfer, nd) as well, China and Asia were "vital trading partners..." And that they "engaged in lucrative commerce..." (Zurndorfer, nd)