War and the economy in the 18th century

 War as an Economic Activity in the “Long” Eighteenth Century. By N.A.M. Rodger. International Journal of Maritime History. XXII, No. 2 (December 2010): 1-18

This is a short journal article, but the message is profound—and deeply underappreciated. It is about the role of technology. To understand the growth of capitalism in the 17th and 18th centuries, you must understand navies. To be a successful navy, you need to have good ships—obviously enough. A country that wanted to rule the waves therefore needed to invest heavily in new technological innovations. These, in turn, spilled over to the rest of the economy. In addition, you had to have an efficient bureaucracy—for instance, to supply ships thousands of miles from home. This encouraged better government. It is no coincidence that countries with the best navies tended to have the most sophisticated economies: the Dutch in the 17th century, the French for part of the 18th century and the British in the 19th.