ABSTRACT

The First World War is a seminal event in the periodization of waves of global integration. Economic historians often portray the war as the end of an era of globalization and the hegemony of classical liberalism.1 The war is treated as a shift from an interconnected global economic system to a system that embraced fierce economic nationalism and autarky. Certainly, if we focus on certain regions and sectors of the global economy-European foreign direct investment, for instance-then a story of deglobalization emerges. Indeed, many of the economic connections that had previously driven globalization were severed due to the war. The Pax Britannica and the mercantilism of the European empires largely characterized the pre-war wave of globalization. It is understandable why the end of the peace, the rise of American economic power, and Woodrow Wilson’s confrontation with imperialism after the war can be conflated with the end of this wave.