Capital versus coercion: England, the Dutch Republic and France

Winston Churchill introduces his account of the Battle of Blenheim, on the banks of the Danube, on 13 August 1704, in the following way:

The wide plain, bathed in the morning sunlight, was covered with hostile squadrons and battalions...

In the battle, Churchill’s ancestor, John Churchill, First Duke of Marlborough, and the imperial commander-in-chief Eugene of Savoy, inflicted a crushing defeat on the French-Bavarian army.²

In the period 1688—1714, France was at almost continuous war with a number of other countries, including England; there were only five years of peace (1697— 1702). From a territorial point of view, the two wars resulted in relatively minor changes, despite the French success in the former and failure in the latter. The greatest change, Louis XIV’s grandson succeeding to the Spanish Empire, was the result of the late king of Spain’s will (1700). From an English point of view, the latter of the two wars marked the beginning of the country’s rise to a leading power of Europe, surpassing France at sea and as a colonial power, while in addition, the Battle of Blenheim introduced a series of English victories over French armies that

made Louis sue for peace at almost any price in 1709. Whether there was a real French recovery in the following years or disaster was avoided only because of increasing British passivity is disputed.³ In any case, the peace treaties of Utrecht (1713) and Rastatt (1714) were not disasters from a French point of view.

Why this difference? The answer to this question leads us directly into a central debate on the rise of the modern state, notably the question of the contrast between absolutism and constitutionalism, which has played an important part in the discussion between modern historians and social scientists. Among the latter, the starting-point has often been Barrington Moore’s attempt to trace the origins of democracy and dictatorship in the twentieth century, in which he strongly emphasized the urban origins of democracy.⁵ As we have seen, this idea was then applied to early modern history by Charles Tilly, who distinguished between coercion and capital, and a series of later scholars. More recently, however, the term ‘absolutism’ has frequently been criticized and the limited power of kings of countries like Prussia, France and Spain been emphasized.⁶ The king was still bound by the laws and his actual power over his kingdom was, in practice, limited. In particular, the difference between European absolutism and the stronger and more arbitrary power of rulers like the emperor of China and the Ottoman Sultan has been pointed out.⁷ On the other hand, the assemblies usually represented only a small part of the population. Nevertheless, the difference between the two kinds of regime is significant enough to deserve a discussion.