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| The
Impact of Mercantilism and Roman Catholic Church on
the Development of Western Europe and New World
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The development of mercantilism produced a profound impact
on the development of western Europe and the entire world.
Historically, mercantilism defined the basic ideology that
dominated in western Europe and western civilization in the
1600s and even in later epochs, even though mercantilism was
not shaped as a theory at the early stages of its development.
Nevertheless, the mercantilist ideology was one of the mainstream
ideologies of that epoch and it proved to be so powerful and
significant that it had managed to replace Christianity as
the dominant ideology, though mercantilism has preserved some
elements of Christianity, adapting its ideas and beliefs to
more pragmatic theoretical assumptions of mercantilism. In
such a context, the decrease of the role of the Roman Catholic
Church and the consistent strengthening of mercantilism became
two major factors that laid the foundation for the capitalist
system which gradually outgrew into the dominant system which
define socioeconomic and political relations throughout the
world. At the same time, the emergence of mercantilism and
the decline of the role of the Roman Catholic Church did not
bring positive results only. In fact, the hegemony of the
Roman Catholic Church was far from perfect and, being based
on Christian beliefs and principles, the church used the religion
as a tool of manipulating and control of the mass consciousness,
while the mercantilism undermined the position of the Roman
Catholic Church and changed the perception of the world dramatically.
Mercantilism became the alternative to the Roman Catholic
Church, which paved the way to the capitalism, while the dominance
of the Roman Catholic Church would more likely prolonged the
stagnation of the international economic relations and maintain
the backwardness of western civilization. In this respect,
mercantilism turns to be an effective tool with the help of
which, through the development of capitalism, countries of
western Europe had made an economic breakthrough and eventually
launched their aggressive imperialistic policy of colonization
of the New World and other parts of the world. On the other
hand, the emergence of capitalism was inevitable and the ongoing
dominance of the Roman Catholic Church or the absence of mercantilism
are likely to delay the development of capitalism but they
could not prevent it because capitalism was developed on the
basis of the changes that took place in socioeconomic relations
while mercantilism and Christianity mainly refer to the ideological
sphere, they explain socioeconomic relations and they even
develop certain rules. However, their theoretical assumptions
and rules only interpret and mirror the socioeconomic reality
but they do not create it.
On analyzing the development of mercantilism, it is necessary
to point out that mercantilism did not appear spontaneously.
In stark contrast, mercantilism developed steadily as a response
to the consistent qualitative changes that took place in the
socioeconomic life of western European society in 1600s. In
this respect, it is important to underline the fact that mercantilism
was, to a significant extent, opposing to the Roman Catholic
Church, but it was not the only movement which actually offered
an alternative view compared to the view of the Roman Catholic
Church. In actuality, mercantilism was developed under the
impact of the growing opposition to the Roman Catholic Church
in different parts of western Europe. The process of Reformation,
the growing dissatisfaction of the population with the Roman
Catholic Church, the moral decay and the deterioration of
the public image of the Roman Catholic Church among its adepts,
who grew more and more disenchanted with the Roman Catholic
Church and ideas it promoted, contributed to the emergence
of various alternative religious movements, which are known
as Protestantism.
In fact, Protestantism had different forms and was inspired
by different historical figures. It is possible to name such
outstanding historical figures as Luther and Calvin who opposed
to the Roman Catholic Church and insisted on the necessity
of its reformation. Basically, they attempted to make Christianity
closer to people and change the role of church as a mediator
making people closer to God and facilitating their communication
with God. In such a context, the trend to strengthening of
Christian churches on the national level grew stronger. At
this point, it is possible to mention the formation and strengthening
of the Anglican Church, which actually became the real power
in England after Henry VIII’s break with the Roman Catholic
Church in 1533-1534 (Landreth and Colander, 2002). As a result,
the king of England became the head of the Anglican Church.
The similar trends could be observed in other European countries,
while in some territories, protestants’ opposition to
the Roman Catholic Church was enforced by the presence of
other religions, such as Judaism as it was the case in Amsterdam.
In such a way, the strengthening opposition to the Roman Catholic
Church in domain of the religion made the weakening of the
Roman Catholic Church practically inevitable.
At the same time, the growing opposition to the Roman Catholic
Church created the favorable conditions for the emergence
of mercantilism because the spread of Protestantism, the creation
of the Anglican Church and similar historical events put under
the question the basic postulates of Christian religion as
it was taught by the Roman Catholic Church. What is more important,
people had started to question whether Christian ideal and
standards imposed on them are worth believing while Christian
norms and rules are worth observing. Instead, people attempted
to change their life and refuse from the conventional stereotypes
and lifestyle imposed on them by the Roman Christian Church.
In this respect, Protestantism and strengthening of national
churches, such as the Anglican Church, stimulated the development
of mercantilism, which promoted more pragmatic ideas compared
to the Roman Catholic Church.
On the other hand, mercantilism was nourished not only by
the growing opposition to the Roman Catholic Church, but also
by the growing wealth of some nations and larger economic
opportunities western European countries, such as England
or Netherland, had got after great geographic discoveries
made in the late 15th – early 16th centuries (Magnusson,
2003). In this respect, it should be pointed out that socioeconomic
development of leading countries of that epoch was accompanied
by consistent changes. The discovery of the New World, the
economic development accelerated by the progressing international
trade led to the dramatic changes in the socioeconomic development
of western Europe and overseas colonies, which created conditions
for the development of capitalism. To put it more precisely,
the international trade and the rapid enrichment of the class
of merchants led to the replacement of the nobility by merchants
or traders. At the same time, the changes in the economy and
technologies allowed the development of the production of
commodities suitable for international exchange which contributed
to the enrichment of merchants and countries which controlled
the international trade. In such a situation, owners of ship,
land, merchants and state became the main power in the socioeconomic
life. In such a context, the control over trade flows and
overseas territories, which were rich and prospective from
economic point of view, became the determinant factor in the
international policy of leading countries because the more
territories and trade flows a country controlled the richer
it would be and the more wealth it could appropriate. In fact,
this idea became one of the major postulates of mercantilism.
Hence, it is obvious that mercantilism was grounded on the
objective reality and socioeconomic relations, which developed
independently from any theoretical developments that means
that the emergence of capitalism was inevitable even without
mercantilism or even if the Roman Catholic Church had preserved
its power over human minds. The inevitability of capitalism
is obvious because the progress of technologies and new opportunities
such western European countries as England got made the socioeconomic
relations purely capitalistic in principle.
As for mercantilism, it should be viewed as a theoretical
framework, which explains and interprets basic socioeconomic
trends which took place in Western Europe and in colonies
in the 1600s. Obviously, mercantilism did not force countries
to colonize the New World, for instance. Instead, countries
struggled for new colonies because it was the question of
their economic and, therefore, political leadership. Naturally,
England could not ignore the strengthening of Spain due to
colonization of American territories. At this point, the key
idea of mercantilism, according to which the prosperity of
the nation depends upon its capital, and that the volume of
the world economy and international trade is unchangeable,
seems to be secondary compared to objective reality of that
epoch. What is meant here is the fact that England, for instance,
was likely to accelerate its imperialist policy not because
of this key concept of mercantilism, which has been just mentioned
above, but because England had lost its leading position in
Europe and in the world, while strong Spain was a threat to
national interests of England because if Spain had a stronger
fleet it would control overseas trade (Niehans, 1990). Consequently,
Spain grew richer while England would be in a very difficult
position. Thus, the imperialism and colonization, which indicated
to the progressing capitalism, developed independently from
the theoretical framework of mercantilism.
In such a context, it is possible to presuppose that even
the ongoing dominance of the Roman Catholic Church could not
stop the progress of capitalism, while mercantilism just became
an almost perfect theory, at the epoch, to explain the major
socioeconomic trends and rules. In fact, the ideology of the
Roman Catholic Church is focused on the worshipping of God
and, what is more, the Roman Catholic variant of Christianity
promotes certain asceticism, while mercantilism lays emphasis
on material values and individualism. It is quite natural
to presuppose that if the Roman Catholic Church remained in
power it could have preserved the world from the emergence
of capitalism because Catholicism did not appreciate the strife
for wealth and the supremacy of material richness over spiritual
one.
However, objectively the development of capitalism was inevitable,
as it has been already proved above, and the maintenance of
the dominance of the Roman Catholic Church could not stop
it. The possible outcome of such dominance would be a permanent
crisis in territories under the control of the Roman Catholic
Church because the gap between the actual, real life and ideas
and principles promoted by the Roman Catholic Church would
grow wider. As a result, Catholic ideas would be viewed by
people as some unreal ideals, a kind of utopia, which had
nothing in common with the real life. It proves beyond a doubt
that the gap between the dominant ideology and the objective
reality perceived by people in their routine life would inevitably
lead to the profound crisis of the dominant ideology, i.e.
the Roman Catholic Church’s ideology. Eventually, the
contradictions between the objective reality and myths imposed
on people by the Roman Catholic Church would become unbearable
and led to the ideological revolution, which actually took
place in the real life and history of Europe and overseas
colonies prove the righteousness of such a hypothesis concerning
the prospects of the ideological domination of the Roman Catholic
Church. In addition, the position of the latter would be undermined
by scientific and technological progress, which, besides,
became a very important factor that accelerated the development
of capitalism because in later epochs it stimulated industrialization,
which, in its turn, made capitalism the dominant socioeconomic
system which proved to be the most effective in the current
situation.
In such a context, the emergence of mercantilism became the
result of the emergence of the early capitalism. However,
it is impossible to underestimate the role of mercantilism
in the further progress of capitalism. As the matter of fact,
mercantilism stimulated the formation of capitalism and laid
foundation for the present day capitalism. In this respect,
it is important to underline the fact that the further development
of capitalism could hardly be as effective as it was without
the theoretical framework provided by mercantilism. What is
meant here is the fact that mercantilism provided the theoretical
ground of capitalism, it explained the strife for wealth and
imperialism of European states by the necessity to increase
the nation’s capital in order to improve the life of
the people through the enrichment of the country. In fact,
this idea justified the policy of colonization, which was
accompanied by terror and physical elimination of the native
population of America, which was absolutely unacceptable for
Christian morale, but, nevertheless, was amply supported by
the Roman Catholic Church that proved the devaluation of its
traditional Christian principles in the 1600s and later epochs
when capitalism grew stronger. At the same, such ideological
justification of colonization and the promotion of individualism,
pragmatism and materialism, which constituted an essential
part of mercantilism, affected dramatically the development
of the American colonies, which naturally inherited the new
ideology of European countries.
Thus, taking into account all above mentioned, it is possible
to conclude that mercantilism emerged on the basis of the
growing opposition to the dominance of the Roman Catholic
Church on the ideological level and as an effective theory
which proved to able to explain and justify basic socioeconomic
trends which progress in the 1600s. In fact, mercantilism
became a theoretical framework which explained and justified
the early capitalism and laid the foundation for the modern
capitalism. In such a situation, the Roman Catholic Church
could not resist to the ideological expansion of mercantilism
because the development of capitalism was inevitable due to
the objective socioeconomic changes that took place in the
world at the epoch. The only thing the dominance of the Roman
Catholic Church could do was to delay the beginning of the
capitalist era.
References:
Landreth, Harry and Colander, David C. (2002). History of
Economic Thought, 4th edition, Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Magnusson, Lars G. (2003). "Mercantilism", in Biddle,
Jeff E.; Davis, Jon B.; Samuels, Warren J.: A Companion to
the History of Economic Thought. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Niehans, Jurg (1990). A History of Economic Theory: Classic
Contributions, 1720–1980. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins
University P
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