ABSTRACT
Basically, Bayly contends that developments from the Silk Roads through the intensification of the trans-regional network and on to the inclusion of the Americas constituted a definite though early form of “globalization,” bringing serious contacts and consequences to the societies involved. Global trade has always closely related to consumer behaviors and motivations. From the Silk Road exchanges through most of the activities on the trans-regional network during early globalization, most relevant consumer involvements stemmed from the elites. The protoglobalization period, embellished by the late-18th-century transition, unquestionably set up conditions for further change – as had been the case with the reverberations of early globalization. International companies might readily seek new ways to increase their profits: it was in the late-18th century, for example, that managers in the East India Company discovered that they could make additional money selling Indian-grown opium to China.
