Changes of Local Market Institutions in the Age of Global Trade Expansion: Asia and North America in the 19th and 20th Centuries
March 15-16, 2009
The international workshop “Changes of Local Market Institutions in the Age of Global Trade Expansion: Asia and North America in the 19th and 20th Centuries” was held at the Keio University Mita Campus March 15-16, 2009. Participants engaged in vibrant discussions on the factors (customs, legal systems, etc.) that prompted transformations in commercial trading arrangements and organizations and on other institutions changes which enabled the globalization of the Asian and U.S. economies during the 19th century and first half of the 20th century. The workshop provided an opportunity for researchers in the historical analysis department to share their findings to date with domestic and foreign researchers.
The three reports in first session “Onto the World Stage: Asian Foreign Trade in the Nineteenth Century” addressed the structural changes in East Asia’s international trade in the 19th century. The reports considered the region’s ties to global trade though tea and other international commodities. They also examined the existing trade structure within East Asia and the reinforcement of that structure, which was closely linked to the Chinese Market through which it functioned.
In the second session, “Global Trade and Its Interaction with the Local Economy,” reports were presented by Associate Professor Sayako Kanda and Lecturer Tomoko Yagyu of the Historical Analysis Department. Both reports clarified the relations between local economies and the expansion of global trade. Prof. Kanda explained how economic and social changes in eastern India (particularly competition in the salt market) led to growth in the trade of English salt, while Lecturer Yagyu examined the society and economy of the antebellum U.S. south (particularly the slave trade) and the growth of the cotton trade.
Reports in the third session “Political Changes and Its Effects on Trade” adopted the Ottoman Empire, colonial India and the Qing dynasty as examples to discuss how the expansion of Western political and military presence influenced changes in regional trade systems and market order through trade treaties and colonial control.
