Las redes comerciales precoloniales en el sureste de Asia

Abstract

Southeast Asia is a region that currently constitutes an economic, political and cultural center of great importance in the world. To achieve this, it has gone through a series of different complex historical processes of long standing, one of which are the interregional trade routes developed during the 13th-15th centuries, before the arrival of the representatives of European imperial powers and the subsequent colonization. Its strategic position, as part of the main trade route between China, Southeast Asia, India, and the Middle East, made this region undergo through a religious, cultural, political and commercial interrelationship, thanks to the maritime diasporas. Throughout history, Southeast Asia has become a dynamic space, characterized by a movement of people and objects; whose dynamism dates from a period previous to the contact with Europeans. In that sense, the analysis of exchange networks prior to such contact becomes relevant, which in turn allow us to understand the current regional context and to identify the characteristics that forged their history and left a mark in the commercial relations, visible even in the contemporary world.