The Caring Fiscal-Military State During the Seven Years War, 1756–1763

Abstract

A B S T R A C T. This article re-examines the concept of the fiscal-military state in the context of the British armed forces during the Seven Years War (1756-63). This war, characteristic of British warfare during the eighteenth century, demonstrates that British victory depended on the state caring about the wellbeing of its troops, as well as being perceived to care. At the practical level, disease among troops led to manpower shortages and hence likely defeat, especially during sieges and colonial campaigns. During the 1762-3 Portuguese campaign, disease was regarded as a sign of ill-discipline, and jeopardized military and political alliances. At Havana in 1762, the fear, reports, and actual outbreaks of disease threatened American colonial support and recruitment for British campaigns. Throughout the controversial campaigns in the German states, disease was interpreted as a symptom of bad governance, and used in partisan criticisms concerning the conduct of the war. Military victory was not only about strategy, command, and technology, but nor was it solely a question of money. Manpower could not simply be bought, but needed to be nurtured in the long term through a demonstration that the British state cared about the welfare of its armies.

The Biopolitics of Manning the Royal Navy in Late Stuart England

“…107 Burchett's declaration was a hopeful assertion in a biopolitical idiom of the seamen's love for a "caring" fiscal-naval state. 108 The more the state cared for the bodies of seamen, the more seamen would be available, and from that healthy multitude of seamen more men would willingly risk life and limb to serve in the Royal Navy. Expressions of a similar biopolitical calculus were not limited to promoters of the armed forces.…”

Entre la malaria, la fiebre amarilla, la viruela y la crisis fiscal en la guerra de independencia, 1815-1819.

“…El presente artículo examina el concepto del estado fiscal-militar en el ámbito del cuidado de la salud de los ejércitos en el marco de las guerras de independencia en la Nueva Granada. Tal perspectiva es abordada por la historiadora de la medicina, Charters (2009) quien estudió las fuerzas militares británicas durante la guerra de los Siete Años (1756-1763), demostrando que la victoria británica dependió de que el Estado se preocupase por el bienestar de sus tropas.…”

“…La historiadora de la medicina, Charters (2009) considera que las guerras y las enfermedades se cruzan con la formación estatal y el fortalecimiento de la autoridad estatal: "traces how responses to disease shaped military strategy, medical theory, and the nature of British imperial authority". Además, como señala Caffarena (2016):…”