Growing labour demand of a starting company. The Dutch maritime labour market and the emergence of the Dutch East India Company (1602-1622).

Abstract

In the 16th century the Dutch Republic the maritime labour market was extraordinarily large for Europeans standards. This means that the Dutch East India Company (V.O.C.), when it was established in 1602, had to fit itself into an already large labour market. This paper will therefore focus on the position of the V.O.C. in the Dutch Maritime labour market between 1602 and 1622 and how it managed to fulfil their labour demand. In the first 8 years of the company the number of employees the V.O.C. sent out fluctuated widely. Therefore, the role of the V.O.C. in the maritime labour market was rather small of unstable. However the employments level saw a steady rise after 1610 and this is wherea transition phase set in of a large company growing larger and demanding more from the maritime labour market.Remarkable is the fact that when the V.O.C. started to expand military involvement in the East the returning personnel was not sufficient anymore to man the new outgoing ships.