International Waters

While the (British) East India Company is far more famous, the first such company that was created for trading purposes but went on to form an empire was the Dutch East India Company. The Dutch, though, were the new kids on the “trading” block: after all, the Netherlands itself came to exist only after it seceded from Spain. By the time the Dutch started looking east for spices and other luxury goods, other European nations were already established players in the East Indies: Spain, Portugal and even England.

 

The Dutch East India Company (known by its Dutch initials as the VOC) had its first major skirmish with another European power when it captured a Portuguese ship named Santa Catarina off the coast of Singapore, as narrated in this Captivating History book on the VOC:

“The Dutch took its precious cargo. It consisted of Chinese raw silk, clothing, and spices.”

But more than that, it exposed the vulnerability of the Portuguese. It also raised other questions: was this an act of war by Holland? Or just an act of piracy?

 

Like any modern-day corporation, the VOC “launched a campaign to sway both international and domestic opinion in its favour”. And one of those arguments established something that holds even today:

“The Dutch East India Company formulated its defense through the notion that the seas were international territory and hence a public domain.”

I didn’t understand how this argument had any relevance to the issue of Santa Catarina, but relevant or not, they had muddied the waters and changed the topic of debate. The idea that “seas were international territory” (Mare Liberum) was opposed by the Spaniards, Portuguese and the English. They supported the principle of Mare Clausum, which said:

“A sea was closed to other naval powers once one nation claimed it.”

 

The issue was finally settled in the early 18th century:

“It was agreed that the territorial sea of one nation was limited to three miles from the coast it held while the rest of the oceans were considered free or international waters.”

The concept of international waters hasn’t changed much since then.

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