TRANSPORTATION 77 



to restrain the changes of place of the material to the possibly 

 least measure. 1 



In all other treatises of transportation by economists especially 

 the relation of the state to transportation stands in the foreground. 

 Only lately Schmoller, in his Grundriss der allgemeinen Volkswirt- 

 schaftslehre, recognized the real significance of transportation as 

 the base of the social process of productivity and distribution of 

 income. 



It cannot be said that the position of transportation in the political 

 economic science is generally recognized and assured. It is certain 

 that transportation is treated exhaustively in treatises in which the 

 relations of the state to economy are the object of scientific research, 

 as in the separate treatment of political economy customary in Ger- 

 many. Here the organization and the juridic conditions of the 

 institutions of transportation are examined. The theory of national 

 economy has, however, not yet obtained any sure gain from these 

 studies, though relations to it are not lacking. But an independent 

 science of transportation had not yet been founded till now. The 

 last decades have, indeed, called forth an extraordinarily copious 

 and comprehensive literature of the railroad, and special railroad- 

 schools were established in Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and 

 England; during the last few years also the scientific treatment of 

 navigation has been advanced remarkably, yet no attempt has been 

 made to investigate the inner connection of the decisive facts and 

 to found them upon a general theoretical base. But transportation 

 is so closely connected with the entire life that its modern develop- 

 ment in a number of sciences has produced strong suggestions which, 

 in different cases, offer a clear image of the mutual relations of the 

 sciences. Above all, the close connection of transportation with 

 the physical features of the surface of the earth, with the courses 

 of rivers, and the extent of seas has effected that geography occupies 

 itself with these objects in a penetrating manner. 



When, in the epoch of commercialism, about the middle of the 

 eighteenth century, the interest in the investigation of the economic 

 conditions of the state and of the rival countries awoke, as a part 

 of the great systematic science of commerce, the representation of 

 the expansion of commercial politics, of the articles of traffic, and of 

 the commercial roads arose, which became then an integral part 

 of political geography, and, finally, also, of the kindred statistics 

 and political science, systematized by Achenwall. In modern times 

 it has been integrated, and besides, the conception of economical 

 geography has been formed, which would have to show the influence 

 of " the physis of space upon the transportation and production of 



1 Principles of Political Economy, 1837-40; Principles of Social Science, 1858-59. 



