From Periphery to Centre: Transatlantic Capital Flows, 1830–1890

Abstract

One of the major factors in the configuration of the ‘first globalisation’ observed in the Atlantic economy, as analysed by Kevin O’Rourke and Jeffrey Williamson, was the international flow of capital. Both authors argue that the first wave of the globalisation process took place before the First World War, no earlier than 1870. In this regard their impeccable work merits at least two critiques. First, O’Rourke and Williamson barely consider the presence of international flows of capital before that period – in particular, during the second and third quarters of the nineteenth century. Second, and most importantly, their analysis centres on, in their own words, ‘capital exports from the centre to the periphery’.2