|
Why Amsterdam? Short answer:
The history and what it's become. The History The Netherlands was the home of much of what made the modern world. The Netherlands ruled the western world in the 1600s, just as the Spanish had before, and the British and then Americans would, afterward -- and using many of the same avenues: military might but, most importantly, economic might. In many ways, the shape of capitalism first becomes recognizable in the Netherlands during the 1600s. So, in the same way an art lover cannot pass up Florence, anyone interested in socio-economic history (that is, how society and the world became what it is today) cannot pass up the Netherlands. Politically, one may say it started with the Dutch Declaration of Independence which is the first declaration of independence in modern times. One can see how the political thinking of the times played itself out in this account. But the social and economic foundations lay hundreds of years earlier in things that, while not uniquely Dutch, seemed to progress further, there, firts. Example: One of the first signs of a middle class, trade guilds. But things really got underway with the first clearly "publicly owned" companies, such as the Dutch West India Company. It was not all pretty, as the tulip mania demonstrates. What It's Become I had hoped to write more about this on the following pages. This isn't likely to happen any time soon, so for now. |