The box and the Encinal Terminal: an archaeology of globalization

Abstract

When, in 1817, David Ricardo analysed trade between England and Portugal, he did not consider transportation costs to be important. 2 Similarly, ‘A noted economic historian . . . had long proclaimed to students that while the container was an important development, it was too simple to deserve much study’. 3 But, despite its relative neglect, the logistics of transport play a crucial part in the codes and mode of production of goods. In 1960, nearly half of the shipping cost of goods consisted in the loading and unloading of separate items in a ship’s hold, so-called ‘break bulk cargo’. Similarly, a study conducted in 1954 showed that nearly half of the time taken for a cargo to travel from the USA to Germany was spent in port. Containerization reduced loading and unloading times from weeks to hours. Much of the recent academic emphasis on mobility in a globalized world has been on speed. 4