Page 582 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

1222 XXXIX Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

the path, but above all the costs deriving from the adaptation to the following changes,
the so called “induced expenses”. In fact the initial costs are nothing compared to the
burdens imposed by the technical and economic inter-relation of the elements, for
example no one part of a tool works on empty: the engine, the machine it activates and
the means by which it transmits it’s power are all built by adapting them reciprocally;
this goes also for the number and types of machines built, the capabilities and types of
canals used for supplying, moving and removing raw materials and finished product are
calculated rationally in connection one with the other. In these circumstances human
beings show to be particularly suspicious and stubborn in making decisions regarding
situations with so many problems to solve and consequently the decisions for the relevant
investments are very difficult.
From a macro economic viewpoint large scale mechanized manufacturing needs
not only machinery and buildings but huge investments in the so called infrastructures:
particularly streets, bridges, ports and harbors and transportation systems; and schools
for general technical education.
Since all these things are expensive, since we’re talking about massive investments
exceeding excessively the means of the individual firms and finally since this use of
money becomes profitable only after a long period of time, these represent a heavy
load for any pre industrial economy doomed by its technological backwardness to low
productivity.
Hence, there are two kinds of induced expense: one micro economic, burdens mainly
those who first choose to industrialize and the other, essentially macro economic, which
burdens mainly the country that keeps them behind.
But at the end of the XIX Century , Germany, which had never stayed behind like the
“backward countries of today”, had built more productive infrastructures than England,
while expenses connected with growth burdened British companies.
The entire British industry suffered the negative consequences of early urbanization,
for example: the cities of the early 1800s hadn’t been built to accommodate XX Century
industries. In areas where the space between pacemaker and follower isn’t too big,
i.e. where it doesn’t create ever growing poverty, the advantage is for the late comer.
Especially because the effort to catch up produces entrepreneurial and institutional
replies that once affirmed are powerful stimuli for continuous growth.
There was also a matter of mental attitude. A proverb says “it’s easier to get rich
than to stay rich”, that in other words, according to another French proverb, could be
“from poverty to poverty in three generations”. Prosperity and success are in fact ones
worst enemies, on the other hand there’s no better incentive than envy. In the case of
British industries the proverb should read “from poverty to hunting jackets or ermine
togas in three generations” that is, the British wallowed in the success obtained and set
their attention on offices (toga and ermine) connected with more attractive professions
than industrial activities. The weaknesses of the British industry reflected a mix of
amateurism and complacency for the position obtained. The merchants that had once
conquered the markets from all over the world took possessing them for granted, consular
reports talk largely about the incompetence of British exporters, their refusal to adapt