Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk: Review of Georg Schanz’s Englische Handelspolitik gegen Ende des Mittelalters (1883)

Böhm-Bawerk’s review assesses Schanz’s two-volume economic history as an account of the foundations of England’s later economic power. Its central judgment concerns the breadth of the achievement:

Das Buch hält wesentlich mehr, als sein Titel verspricht.

English translation: The book delivers substantially more than its title promises.

What appears under the heading of commercial policy becomes, in the reviewer’s reading, a substantially comprehensive history of English economic development from the aftermath of the Norman Conquest to the death of Henry VIII. Böhm-Bawerk first reconstructs that development, then describes the book’s organization and evaluates its scholarly execution.

His reconstruction turns on the changing role of foreign merchants and craftsmen. An initially agricultural economy, with rudimentary manufactures and limited trade largely controlled by foreigners, attracts outsiders as teachers of commerce, industry, and navigation. Domestic cloth production and a merchant class gradually develop. As English capabilities strengthen, foreign teachers become inconvenient competitors; their exclusion accompanies England’s emergence as an independent industrial and commercial power under the first two Tudors. The conceptual hinge is thus the transition from learning through foreign participation to asserting national economic autonomy.

State intervention accompanies this process, but the review does not present its instruments as uniformly prudent or legitimate. Measures could be coercive, violate rights, or contradict one another, while remaining, in aggregate, purposeful and successful. Böhm-Bawerk explicitly attributes the stronger causal interpretation to Schanz:

In der ganzen Darstellung lässt der Verfasser durchblicken, dass er das wirthschaftliche Emporblühen Englands zum nicht geringen Theil als Frucht der energischen nationalen Wirthschaftspolitik seiner Herrscher ansieht.

English translation: Throughout the whole exposition the author lets it be seen that he regards England's economic flourishing as in no small part the fruit of the energetic national economic policy of its rulers.

This formulation matters: the review sympathetically reports Schanz’s explanation of national development without constructing a general doctrine of economic intervention. Henry VII figures as an able economic policymaker in his own right, while Henry VIII benefits from Wolsey and Cromwell.

The concluding assessment connects historical scope with documentary support. The first volume supplies the narrative, divided into nine chapters on foreign commercial relations and nine on domestic economic policy; the second provides statistical and documentary evidence. Böhm-Bawerk’s praise rests on clarity and perceived fidelity as well as breadth:

Die Darstellung ist klar, bündig, lichtvoll, und macht durchaus den Eindruck grosser Gründlichkeit, Gewissenkaftigkeit und Treue.

English translation: The exposition is clear, succinct, lucid, and thoroughly gives the impression of great thoroughness, conscientiousness, and fidelity.

The review’s significance lies in its appreciative presentation of an economic history that links industrial growth, foreign expertise, commercial rivalry, and governmental action. Its compact argument identifies Schanz’s contribution as both an explanation of England’s rise and a major scholarly enrichment of economic history.