The South China Sea under the colonial encounter in the nineteenth century

In company with commencing the long haul of transformation into modern capitalist economies and nation states, Europeans had conducted a process of expansion that led to European encounters with the “others”, beyond what the scope of the “barbarian” peoples referred to in ancient periods. 1 This process of expansion, begun in the fi fteenth and sixteenth centuries, extended well into following centuries, with expeditions keenly probing around the globe.