This article adopts a historical approach to examine the role played by maritime entrepreneurs and maritime policy-makers in the unprecedented growth of world trade during the second half of the twentieth century. The purpose is to show how globalization as a macroeconomic process was shaped and sustained by human agency operating within maritime business and maritime politics. For more than two decades, economic globalization has been a major field of study within the social sciences. While providing many valuable insights, this literature tends to approach globalization primarily from a macro-perspective and to treat the process largely in quantitative terms. Through a series of separate historical case studies, this article shows the possibilities of more micro- and meso-oriented analysis, focusing more on processes and transformations than stages and outcomes.
