bs2Sep 5, 2022
> #DanielDefoe.. in 1728, warned that #England faced.. struggle in attempting to compete with ‘#China, #India and other Eastern countries’. The problem was that they have ‘the most extended Manufacture, and the greatest variety in the World; and their Manufactures push themselves upon the World, by the..Stress of their Cheapness’. They also may have had the highest real wages in the world.. and the best conditions for working class organisation..
#NoamChomsky's #PowersAndProspects on #FreeTrade
Show threadbs2
> .. the.. success of #Bombay’s #shipyards.. led to their undoing. The #English #ShippingIndustry complained that ‘the families of all the shipwrights in England are certain to be reduced to starvation’ unless #India-built ships were barred from accessing British ports. In 1815, the #BritishParliament passed a law.. that placed tight restrictions on Indian ships.. this law.. was ‘more devastating to.. Indian shipping than all.. technological innovations of the last 300 years put together’
Sep 5, 2022 at 8:53amWeb
Show threadbs2Sep 5, 2022
Reading that second quote in #AmitavGhosh's The #GreatDerangement reminded me of Noam Chomsk's quote of Daniel Defoe. Both examples of #BritishIndustry relying on #Protectionism to get started are from works by #PrasannanParthasarathi. It's nice to see that the upcoming Harvard PhD dissertation, Who Was Rich and Who Was Poor in the Eighteenth Centruy, that #Chomsky quoted in 1996 became a book, _Why Europe Grew Rich and Asia Did Not, of 2011 for #AmitavGhosh to use in 2016. #Parthasarathi