commerce, in economics

commerce, traffic in goods, usually thought of as trade between states or nations. Engaged in by all peoples from the earliest times, it has been carried on in some areas and by some peoples more than others, because of special geographical, technological, or economic advantages. The Egyptians, the Sumerians and later inhabitants of Mesopotamia, the Cretans, the Syrians, the Phoenicians, the Greeks, the Arabs, and the Western Europeans have excelled in commerce, tapping the resources of the East, Oceania, the Americas, and Africa.

The Rise of Commerce in Europe

The Crusades did much to widen European trade horizons and prefaced the passing of trade superiority from Constantinople to Venice and other cities of N Italy. In the 15th and 16th cent. with the sudden expansion of Portugal and Spain the so-called commercial revolution reached a climax. In N and central Europe, the earlier supremacy of the Hanseatic League, the Rhenish cities, and the cities of N France and Flanders was eclipsed by the rise of national states. Antwerp began its long career of glory when the Spanish were losing hegemony, and the Dutch briefly triumphed in the race for world commerce in the 17th cent. The Dutch in turn gave way to a British-French rivalry that by 1815 left Great Britain paramount.

The rise of the chartered company chartered companies, associations for foreign trade, exploration, and colonization that came into existence with the formation of the European nation states and their overseas expansion.
..... Click the link for more information. under the auspices of the national state had much to do with the expansion of trade, as did the modern corporation corporation, in law, organization enjoying legal personality for the purpose of carrying on certain activities. Most corporations are businesses for profit; they are usually organized by three or more subscribers who raise capital for the corporate activities by
..... Click the link for more information. , which later displaced the chartered company. The Industrial Revolution of the 18th and the 19th cent. also fostered the development of commerce, generating both products for trade and the means for trading them. World commerce was aided materially by the invention of the astrolabe, the mariner's compass, and the sextant; by the development of iron and steel construction; by the application of steam to both land and water transport; and by the more recent development of the telephone, telegraph, cable, radio, and the Internet Internet, the, international computer network linking together thousands of individual networks at military and government agencies, educational institutions, nonprofit organizations, industrial and financial corporations of all sizes, and commercial enterprises
..... Click the link for more information. , and of inventions such as refrigeration, the gasoline engine, the electric motor, the airplane, and the computer.

International Trade Today

The theory of commerce as imposed by the national state has varied from the mercantilism mercantilism (mûr`kəntĭlĭzəm), economic system of the major trading nations during the 16th, 17th, and 18th cent.
..... Click the link for more information. of the 17th and 18th cent. and the protective tariff of the 19th and 20th cent. to the free trade that Britain long upheld. After World War II the cold war limited trade between Communist and capitalist countries until the late 1980s, but the need for commercial expansion led to the creation of a number of international and regional systems designed to remove trade barriers. The International Monetary Fund International Monetary Fund (IMF), specialized agency of the United Nations, established in 1945. It was planned at the Bretton Woods Conference (1944), and its headquarters are in Washington, D.C.
..... Click the link for more information. was established in 1944 to help nations finance temporary trade deficits. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), former specialized agency of the United Nations. It was established in 1948 as an interim measure pending the creation of the International Trade Organization.
..... Click the link for more information. (GATT), signed in 1947 by 23 major industrial countries to reduce tariffs, evolved into an ongoing mechanism for reducing trade barriers, and after eight rounds of negotiations, the Uruguay Round (the last round, 1995) created the World Trade Organization World Trade Organization (WTO), international organization established in 1995 as a result of the final round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) negotiations, called the Uruguay Round.
..... Click the link for more information. .

In 1957 the European Economic Community was created, and in the 1980s and early 90s European leaders signed a series of agreements that created a unified West European economy in 1993 (see European Union European Community (EC), an economic and political confederation of European nations, and other organizations (with the same member nations) that are responsible for a common foreign and security policy and for cooperation on justice and home affairs.
..... Click the link for more information. ). In 1992 leaders from the United States, Canada, and Mexico signed the North American Free Trade Agreement North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), accord establishing a free-trade zone in North America; it was signed in 1992 by Canada, Mexico, and the United States and took effect on Jan. 1, 1994.
..... Click the link for more information. (NAFTA); Mercosur Mercosur or Mercosul, officially the Common Market of the South, Latin American trade organization established in 1991 to increase economic cooperation among the countries of E South America.
..... Click the link for more information. was established a year earlier in South America. Nonetheless, national economic interests have been difficult to overcome, and a number of countries, including the United States, passed protectionist legislation and enacted retaliatory tariffs in the 1980s and 90s.

Bibliography

See M. Beard, A History of Business (2 vol., 1938; repr. 1962–63); C. S. Belshaw, Traditional Exchange and Modern Markets (1965); W. Culican, The First Merchant Venturers (1967); R. S. Lopez, The Commercial Revolution of the Middle Ages (1971); R. Rosencrance, The Rise of the Trading State (1986); W. Gill, Trade Wars against America (1990); A. K. Smith, Creating a World Economy (1991); J. J. Schott, ed., The World Trading System (1996).

Commerce, city, United States

Commerce, city (1990 pop. 12,135), Los Angeles co., S Calif., a suburb of Los Angeles; inc. 1960. An important transportation hub for S California, Commerce is the home of several large corporations. There is food processing and diverse manufacturing. In 1927, Charles A. Lindbergh Anne Spencer Morrow Lindbergh, 1906–2001, b. Englewood, N.J., grad. Smith College, 1927, was a writer and aviator. Her more than two dozen works include North to the Orient (1935) and Listen! the Wind
..... Click the link for more information. landed The Spirit of St. Louis at the old Vail Field in Commerce while on a nationwide tour following his transatlantic flight.