I think its a reasonable assertion that the general cultural trends and attitudes and values in Castile, the economic and military recruiting base (if nothing else) of the Spanish Empire, were less favorable to trade and commerce than, for instance, England - through out the the period (1519-1659) Kennedy is discussing.
But those values were the values of the elite that, as asual, are those that are massively recorded through the art and litterature. Also, it seems to me that the situation of a people in a given time-frame is the result of a serie of accountable and material factors like those that we are trying to find here, not something ingrained in the culture of that people, a pretty diverse people in this case by the way. I don't think those kind of things are actually related to the cultures of the peoples. I would say that it's a problem of structures rather than a problem of culture. Certainly I wouldn't call it ethos. In my opinion, that kind of assertions, very common in all the matters related to human diversity and that exits everywhere and in every society, seem more like an attempt to attribute the own precieved virtues/allien percieved defects as something inherent, allowing to further ideological constructions, rather than a way to adress the actual causes, wich are contingent and temporary, often quite prosaic and sometimes even the mere product of luck.
I took the economical reclamations of the Comuneros, which seem to me fairly pro-trade, to show other perspectives existing inside theis same kingdom. Those measures were propossed by the representatives of the castilian Third State, not by a lonely intellectual or an isolated voice. But also, I don't think, for example, that the traders from the Cantabric ports or Seville had more or less anti-trade attitudes than their english counterparts. Due to a set of geopolitical and internal power struggles, the rulers decided to implement certain politics that discouraged trade, but is that represeentative of the castilian social ethos? is there even such a thing as a castilian, or french, or chinese social ethos? Plus, considering that the worse part of those politics was implemented by a foreing dinasty...
"Although foreigners frequently regarded the empire of Charles V or that of Philip II as monolithic and disciplined, it was in fact a congeries of territories, each of which possessed its own priviliges and was proud of its own distinctiveness. There was no central administration (let alone legislature or judiciary) and the only real connecting link was the monarch himself." How is this a hypercentralized state? How is this a centralized state at all? All roads lead to Madrid (or to put it another way, all roads lead away from Toledo) does not make a centralized state.
Not dismissing the other stuff, but I have less to comment on it as its not in such opposition to the issues Kennedy raises.
Sorry, I should have been clearer in this point. The point about the polymorphic nature of the Habsburg empire is obviously correct in the great picture. But I'm referreing here exclusively to Castille (excluding the basque territores, which indeed kept their laws and privileges) Before the revolt of the Comuneros, castilian cities had a large degree of autonomy. The
Comunidades de villa y tierra (literally, Communities of ville and land) were autonomous entities whose only political mutual relation was the crown. They consisted generally of a populated center and a more or less large hinterland amongst other things with ability to rise taxes, with their own laws (fueros), militias and a government body elected by the neighbors (actually the urban patriciate, but still not the king or other external authority). They had also representation in the Cortes. In many cases it was very similar in the
Merindades north of the Duero river. That autonomy was removed by Charles V after the defeat of the Comuneros and never recovered.
On the other hand, once the capital was installed in Madrid, the royal policies benefited their new centre of power in detriment of the rest of the kingdom, as it happened with many other capitals in other countries. The fact about the demographical decline of all the other cities while Madrid grew in the 17th century is quite representative IMO, because it means a demographical spoliation of the rest kingdom in favour of the capital against all economical logic (in combination with the battery of epidemies that hit the country during the century, a terrible dissaster). The radial structure of the communications is a symptom of this, but this is a phenomenom whose key moments happened latter and in a different context. The cities of the iberian plateau suffered the most with the rise of Madrid, becoming economical and political dependencies of the capital, thus frustrating and reducing their potential of development. Otherwise, a second rate city in the middle of nowhere like Madrid, with it's medium-mountain climate would be only useful for summer health ressorts for asthmatics. Of course, this is a factor to be considered in conjuction with others, otherwise France should be in worsestate than Spain, though Paris at least has economical sense by herself.
Cheers.