Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen · 1914
Schullern’s brief German review assesses the substantially revised third edition of Supino’s economic study of navigation. Eight of its sixteen chapters are new, making the revision almost a new work in the reviewer’s judgment. His opening survey establishes its breadth: economic and technical progress in shipping, maritime trade, inland navigation, state intervention, and contemporary maritime protectionism.
The review moves from scope to the moral standing of seafaring, recounting Supino’s image of the captain obliged to risk his life, leave his ship last, and share his sailors’ final crust. This ethic of sacrifice introduces a stronger economic claim about the compatibility of private and public interests:
Wirtschaftlich betrachtet, ist der individuelle Vorteil, den der Schifffahrtsunternehmer im Auge hat, nie im Widerspruch, sondern immer in vollkommener Uebereinstimmung mit dem sozialen Wohle.
English translation: Considered economically, the individual advantage which the shipping entrepreneur has in view is never in contradiction with, but always in perfect agreement with, the social welfare.
Schullern reports this categorical alignment without challenging it. Supino’s rationale links the merchant fleet’s commercial expansion to national military strength, international prestige, trade, and wealth. The conceptual move is thus from the shipowner’s individual incentive to collective benefits understood in both economic and state-political terms. The principle of economic efficiency remains the organizing idea of the treatment.
The review closes by praising the abundance of factual and numerical evidence, which enlivens the exposition, and by stressing its currency in matters of public policy:
Die einschlägige Staatstätigkeit ist bis zur allerneuesten Zeit berücksichtigt, insbesondere soweit das Subventionswesen in Frage steht.
English translation: The relevant activity of the state is taken into account down to the very latest period, particularly so far as the system of subsidies is in question.
Subsidies give the review’s final emphasis a concrete policy focus. Its favorable assessment rests on Supino’s integration of shipping enterprise, national interests, and state activity, supported by extensive empirical material; it offers an appreciative account of that framework rather than a developed examination of its tensions.
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