This contribution examines an important triangulation in the thought of Hugo Grotius, or Hugo de Groot (1583–1645): his biblically based effort to redefine private property; a Remonstrant (or Arminian) theological framework for his definition of the free-willing and rational individual who could choose good or evil, as well as punish evil in others; and his work for the Dutch East India Company (VOC), which in many ways framed all that he wrote. Through these three items, Grotius developed an initial framework for international law, especially the ideology of “freedom of the seas,” or what is now called “freedom of navigation.” The question that arises through this analysis is whether the universal category of “freedom of the seas” as well as his idea of human nature are vitiated by the specific context in which they arose and the interests they served, or whether one can indeed develop universals, recognized by others, from specific contexts.

This chapter examines the fall of Dutch Taiwan to a Chinese state (the Zheng family maritime state) in 1662, suggesting that that event can be understood by focusing on two things. First, the VOC, although the most powerful maritime structure of Europe, was successful in East Asia largely because East Asian states were less interested in controlling maritime space and ports than were European states. The Zheng state, born in the 1650s, was an anomaly in East Asia: a Chinese state oriented toward seaborne commerce. Second, Zheng military power was high, although Dutch military techniques and technologies proved instrumental in holding off his numerically superior army for nearly a year. The chapter ends with counterfactual speculations about what would have happened had the Dutch held Taiwan: the Qing dynasty, which eventually defeated the Zheng family and took Taiwan, would not have incorporated Taiwan into its empire.