Navigation Acts - Effects On Britain

Effects On Britain

The introduction of the legislation caused Britain's shipping industry to develop in isolation. However, it had the advantage to English shippers of severely limiting the ability of Dutch ships to participate in the carrying trade to England. The Navigation Acts, by reserving British colonial trade to British shipping, may have significantly assisted in the growth of London as a major entrepôt for American colonial wares at the expense of Dutch cities. The maintenance of a certain level of merchant shipping and of trade generally also facilitated a rapid increase in the size and quality of the Royal Navy, which eventually (after the Anglo-Dutch Alliance of 1689 limited the Dutch navy to three-fifths of the size of the English one) led to Britain becoming a global superpower until the mid-20th century. That naval might, however, never was sufficient to limit Dutch trading power. The reason was that the Dutch trading system rested on such a degree of leverage over overseas markets and shipping resources, combined with a financial power that was only overtaken by Great Britain during the 18th century (after the Glorious Revolution), that it enabled the Dutch to put sufficient pressure on the English to prevent them from sustaining naval campaigns of sufficient length to wrest maritime concessions from the Dutch.