Geopolitics and trade: A study of the relationship between military power and commerce before World War I

This dissertation examines the relationship between military power and commerce and how military rivalry affects trade relations. At the heart of these issues is the role and utility of military power in peacetime and the significance of economic interdependence for conflict among states. Does military power decline in importance as economic interaction increases? Does trade moderate conflict? Interdependence theory answers "yes" to these questions. In contrast, I argue that commercial and military expansion go together; commercial expansion creates roles for military power. Peacetime conflict simply has a far more complex relationship to trade than interdependence theorists have allowed.;To investigate these questions, I analyzed data from seven countries in the era before World War I: the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, and Japan. The data pertain to protectionism, military power, the relative positions of these states in various trade markets, shipping, and canal operations. I employed regression models, simple correlations, descriptive statistics, and substantive description and analysis of commercial and military policies. These data were gathered from national statistical documents (e.g., Annuaire Statistique de la France, Annual Abstract of Statistics, Statistika Rossiiskoi Imperii) of each country, complemented by secondary abstracts.;Despite important differences among the Great Powers in this period, military strength and commerce moved together among them. Maritime commerce and land trade assumed strategic importance. Commercial issues were usually entwined in diplomatic-military competitions. Protectionism, access to commodities, shipping security and access, and offensive opportunities afforded by trade produced military policies designed to safeguard or expand commerce. Moreover, trade among the Great Powers expanded along with mutual antagonisms; but the trade of the Great Powers with peripheral areas, themselves the foci of rivalry, fragmented as competition intensified--demonstrated by the cases of Turkey, Egypt, Rumania, and China. Trade expansion among the Great Powers coexisted with increasing diplomatic rivalry, however. Thus contrary to the misleading assertions of interdependence theorists, decisive evidence shows that military power and commerce are bound together in peacetime: commercial interests are central to calculating the international distribution of power.