The European Fiscal-Military System 1530-1870

Project Information

FMSystem

Grant agreement ID: 787504

DOI

10.3030/787504

Project closed

EC signature date 24 April 2018

Start date 1 August 2018

End date 31 January 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 2 499 853,00

EU contribution

€ 2 499 853,00

Coordinated by

THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
United Kingdom

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - FMSystem (The European Fiscal-Military System 1530-1870)

Reporting period: 2023-02-01 to 2025-01-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

FMSystem sought to understand the longer historical context of the contemporary issue of the outsourcing of warfare by states to private contractors. Our research has transformed the conventional narrative of the violent rise of the European states system by revealing how belligerent competition also involved cooperation. States’ emergence was co-dependent and entailed developing ways to obtain warmaking resources from beyond their jurisdictions through what we identify as a ‘Fiscal Military System’ which emerged around 1530 and lasted until about 1870 when warfare became more fully nationalised. This is the paradox of European history. Competition was only possible through cooperation with allies, neutrals and even enemies, because states rarely obtained all they needed for warfare from their own populations, while governments were generally unable to prevent their own subjects from aiding other powers.
The Fiscal Military System developed symbiotically with state sovereignty in Europe, before being dismantled as states consolidated their hold over their own populations and warmaking resources. It evolved in parallel with state sovereignty from the 1530s, maturing around 1700 before being progressively dismantled as national states were consolidated between about 1790 and 1870. War-making was by now fully nationalised, and the last elements of ‘private’ or semi-private extra-territorial violence were eliminated almost completely. The era of fully nationalised, modern warfare has proved historically comparatively brief, giving way around 1990 to a postmodern, increasingly post-national war making which is increasingly dependent on private military and security companies and in which armed non-state actors have assumed considerable importance. Contemporary conditions do not represent a ‘return of the mercenary’ or any other allegedly pre-modern forms, but nonetheless, an examination of the significance of early modern extra-territorial resource mobilisation can help us pose better questions about the present.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

We have investigated the transnational exchange of warmaking resources between states and non-state actors from the early sixteenth to later nineteenth centuries through six case studies. Five examined key locations which served as ‘hubs’ for organising the exchange of military personnel, experts, information and intelligence, finance, war materials, and use of foreign facilities, including the transit across other states’ territory and waters. These cases were Amsterdam, Geneva, Genoa, London, and Vienna. A sixth study was framed regionally by tracking the movement of key military assets in and out of the Baltic using the digitised Sound Toll data. Additionally, the PI examined all aspects across Europe to plot key continuities and changes in practice, and to explain how and why the system emerged, developed, and was eventually progressively dismantled as previously accepted practices lost their legitimacy.
Our combination of qualitative and quantitative methods allowed us to measure the scale and scope of the interchange between states and non-state actors in the supply of war resources. We have discovered that virtually all resources came from Europe, with non-European supply being important in only a few instances, notably saltpetre, a key ingredient of gunpowder. States interacted with the system differently with this changing over time. For instance, Britain initially exported manpower and some armaments, switching after 1688 to hire large numbers of auxiliaries with the onset of each new conflict. By contrast, Sweden relied heavily on foreign subsidies to defend itself. We capitalised on the economies of scale deriving from pursuing disparate yet interconnected strands of research simultaneously and to examine phenomena which are usually studied separately, such as money transfers and military operations.
We have published our findings in 19 peer reviewed open access outputs, with a further 8 in press, and six books under contract. A further book, co-authored by the project team, will showcase our findings through 64 objects and images exemplifying key aspects of the exchange of warmaking resources. This is under contract and will be published open access. Additionally, we disseminated our findings through organising 7 workshops and conferences, by presenting papers to scholars and the wider public, and publishing a series of blogs on our website. We are also making available two sets of quantitative research data on a stable openly accessible platform.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Our project has broadened research beyond the established focus on the national state by highlighting the importance of external resources to warmaking. For much of the period we have investigated, European armed forces relied on foreigners for a fifth or more of their manpower, while external subsidies and loans were often essential in paying for conflicts. Dependency on imports could be far greater for critical assets, notably gunpowder, while foreign expertise was instrumental in disseminating new practices, reforming armed forces, and establishing or developing war industries. The Fiscal Military System drew on practices emerging to facilitate commerce, but also created bespoke methods, such as the contracts used to agree the transfer or temporary hire of military personnel.
These practices became standardised in the later seventeenth century as European armed forces simultaneously assumed more permanent, institutional forms. These insights add to the existing models of the Fiscal Military State, which emphasises institution-building and revenue raising, as well as the Contractor State which concentrates on whether outsourcing to private individuals and businesses proved more effective than state-managed provision of manpower and supplies. We were able to examine transactions from the different perspectives of those providing resources, those facilitating their exchange, those benefiting from obtaining this assistance, and those affected by the transaction. We have discovered numerous interconnections between historical actors and have pursued the most informative through joint research across several of the case studies. Our research underscores how both the existing models capture two different aspects of resource mobilisation, whilst identifying the importance of external supply as a third factor.

Albrecht von Wallenstein as Mars, the god of war (del Bianco)