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on Business, Economic and Financial History |
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Issue of 2013‒11‒29
43 papers chosen by |
| By: | Bakker, Gerben |
| Abstract: | We investigate the long-run historical pattern of R&D-outlays by reviewing aggregate growth rates and historical cases of particular R&D projects, following the historical-institutional approach of Alfred Chandler (1962), Douglass North (1981) and Oliver Williamson (1985). We find that even the earliest R&D-projects used non-insignificant cash outlays and that until the 1970s aggregate R&D outlays grew far faster than GDP, despite five well-known challenges that implied that R&D could only be financed with cash, for which no perfect market existed: the presence of sunk costs, real uncertainty, long time lags, adverse selection, and moral hazard. We then review a wide variety of organisational forms and institutional instruments that firms historically have used to overcome these financing obstacles, and without which the enormous growth of R&D outlays since the nineteenth century would not have been possible. |
| Keywords: | R&D-project financing–-history; R&D-financing institutions; sunk costs; historical R&D-project cost case studies Britain; United States |
| JEL: | F3 G3 |
| Date: | 2013–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:54518&r=his |
| By: | Broadberry, Stephen |
| Abstract: | As a result of recent work on historical national accounting, it is now possible to establish firmly the timing of the Great Divergence of living standards between Europe and Asia. There was a European Little Divergence as Britain and Holland overtook Italy and Spain, and an Asian Little Divergence as Japan overtook China and India. The Great Divergence occurred because Japan grew more slowly than Britain and Holland, starting from a lower level. Key turning points are identified around 1348 and 1500, and an explanatory framework is developed that can explain these divergences via the differential impact of shocks on differently structured economies. The key shocks were the Black Death of the mid-fourteenth century and the new trade routes which opened up from Europe to Asia and the Americas at the end of the fifteenth century. The key structural factors were the type of agriculture, the age of first marriage of females, the flexibility of labour supply and the nature of state institutions. |
| JEL: | B1 N0 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:54573&r=his |
| By: | Irina Savelieva (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). Poletaev In-stitute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities (IGITI). Director) |
| Abstract: | The paper analyzes the contents and objectives of ‘public history’, the relationship between scholarly and popular knowledge, conventions governing the representation of the past out-side the academic context, and the transfer of scholarly knowledge from academic to media environment. The article is divided into sections titled What? Who? When? Why? What for? and How? These lapidary subtitles reflect the fact that very little has been written about public history yet, and a preliminary review of the field is necessary. First of all, we need to deter-mine what kind of new historical work it is, and to draw several distinctions between different types of historians who engage in professional and/or public history. Public history is treated as a specific type of historical judgment and historical practice, thus the analysis of ‘public history’ covers cognitive aspects as well as social ones |
| Keywords: | public history, academic knowledge, popular knowledge, transmission of knowledge, media, professionals, public, modes of historical writing, disciplinary conventions, historical method, historical truth, vocation, participation, education |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:34hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Irina Savelieva (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). Poletaev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities (IGITI). Director) |
| Abstract: | The paper analyzes the objects, concepts and methods of cultural history / histoire culturelle / Kulturgeschichte / kulturnaya istoriya, a modern historical subdiscipline that exists in different national historiographical traditions. This subdiscipline’s objects of study, such as social institutions, social networks, daily interactions, childhood, cultural memory, corporality, etc., lie in a borderland. Therefore, the paper focuses on interdisciplinary interaction in relation to history and raises the question of the institutional boundaries of disciplines. |
| Keywords: | History, culture, cultural history, neue Kulturgeschichte, histoire culturelle, theory, research method, interdiscipilnarity, interdisciplinary object of study, institutional boundaries of disciplines, axiomatic core. |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:13hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Isaías N. Chaves; Stanley L. Engerman; James A. Robinson |
| Abstract: | One of the great puzzles of Sub-Saharan African economic history is that wheeled transportation was barely used prior to the colonial period. Instead, head porterage was the main method of transportation. The consensus among historians is that this was a rational adaption to the underlying conditions and factor endowments. In this paper we undertake the first systematic investigation of the relative costs of the different forms of wheeled transportation in Africa. We focus on calculating the social savings and social rate of return associated with the introduction of the railway into colonial British West Africa. We provide more speculative estimates of the social savings of other forms of wheeled transportation. We find that all forms of wheeled transportation were economically efficient in the sense that they increased national income, though the estimated social savings of railways were modest when compared to GDP. However, we also find that the social rate of return of railways was exceedingly high, with annual social returns being equivalent to the entire capital outlays in Nigeria, i.e., railways there had a social rate of return of around 100%. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, railways appear to have been a very good social investment in West Africa because they were cheap to build. We discuss some alternative hypotheses that may nevertheless account for why they were not adopted. |
| JEL: | N77 O33 R40 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19673&r=his |
| By: | Aleksandr Rusanov (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). Poletaev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities (IGITI). Research assistant;) |
| Abstract: | The paper reviews the problem of caesuras and continuity of Portuguese University’s history. A study of the University papers showed gaps in its institutional history caused by several relocations from Coimbra to Lisbon. Sometimes such caesuras raise doubts in the continuity of the University’s history and suggest the existence of different studia generalia that alternated with each other for the period under study. However, contemporary historians and members of the university community view the different universities as parts of one and the same university. Our case-study demonstrates that this view is based on the documents concerning economic privileges granted to the University by the country’s rulers and the Roman popes. If recognized as a new university, the studium generale would have lost its former privileges. Thus, the logic of collective memory of Portuguese University was based on the image of its historical continuity |
| Keywords: | university history, Portuguese University, royal privileges, archives, economics |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:37hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Apollon Davidson (1Ordinary professor, National Research University Higher School of Economics; Academician, Russian Academy of Sciences) |
| Abstract: | This article is devoted to relations between Russia and South Africa from the mid-17th to the early 19th century. It covers first attempts at sending Russian expeditions around the Cape of Good Hope by Peter the Great and Catherine II and describes how the first Russians reached the Cape from the other end, from Kamchatka. It goes on to describe the trips to the Cape by Russian naval officers and other Russians, some of whom spent a long time in South Africa and left interesting descriptions of the Cape. A unique testimony to the fact that black South Africans knew about Russia is presented in the letter of a Pondo chief to the Russian tsar. The most significant part of Russia’s relations with South Africa was its preoccupation with South African affairs during the Anglo-Boer War of 1899–1900, when Russian volunteers went to fight for the Boers and two medical detachments were sent to treat their wounded. At that time Russia even established diplomatic relations with Transvaal. Mutual interest in the mining sphere is also analysed, and relations between some Russian and South African intellectuals are mentioned. Immigration of Russian Jews to South Africa is also described. |
| Keywords: | South Africa, Transvaal, Anglo–Boer War, Peter the Great, Witsen, Cathrine the Great, Beniovsky, Golovnin, Goncharov, van Riebeeck, Nicholas II, Grand Duke Alexei, Pondo, Olive Schreiner, Leipoldt, Maximov, Russian Jews. |
| JEL: | N97 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:21hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Petr Rezvykh (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia), Poletayev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities) |
| Abstract: | Using a discussion on the significance of Ancient Greek ordinances between F.W.J. Schelling and Count S.S. Uvarov as an example, this article analyses the complex interaction between theological, philosophical, religious, and political factors in the reception of Schelling’s philosophical ideas in Russia in the XIX century. |
| Keywords: | F.W.J. Schelling, S.S. Uvarov, romanticism, mythology, ordinances, Russian philosophy, history of humanities. |
| JEL: | Z12 Z19 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:24hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Berge, Erling (Centre for Land Tenure Studies, Norwegian University of Life Sciences); Sigrid Haugset, Anne (Trøndelag R&D Institute) |
| Abstract: | More than 200 years after the King sold one of the “King’s commons” (Follafoss, located in the current Verran municipality) to urban timber merchants, local people in some ways still behave as if the area is a kind of commons. The paper will outline the history of the transformation of the area from an 18th century King’s commons to a 21th century battleground for ideas about ancient access and use rights of community members facing rights of a commercial forest owner and the local consequences of national legislation. This battleground will be illuminated by the answers that current users provide to questions about what they believe their rights of access and use are. We shall in particular look for differences between what people believe and what the law seems to say about rights and duties in the Follafoss area. |
| Keywords: | King’s commons; private forest; rights of common; customary rights; national legislation; loss of customary rights; |
| JEL: | P48 Q15 |
| Date: | 2013–11–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:nlsclt:2013_013&r=his |
| By: | Alexander Mikhailovsky (National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE)) |
| Abstract: | This paper is concerned with one of the most prominent examples of German intellectual history at the beginning of the 20th century, the George circle. The study identifies three principles which are crucial for the “political theology” of the George circle – the principle of covenant, the principle of the charismatic leader and the principle of dominance and service. The main hypothesis is that the George circle was an ideologically integrated group of intellectuals who sought to reform politics by means of aesthetics, and influenced the language and ideology of the “conservative revolution” in Weimar Germany |
| Keywords: | political theology, Stefan George, George circle, Friedrich Gundolf, Friedrich Wolters, dominance and service, aestheticization of the political, conservative revolution. |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:26hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Josemiguel Lana Berasain; Miguel Laborda Pemán |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to contribute to the analysis of nested governance of common-pool resources from a long-term perspective. Our main research questions are: How was nesting articulated in pre-industrial societies? Which were their advantages and risks? Which are the factors that explain their origin and dynamics? To answer them, we analyse two historical case studies of nested regimens. In particular, the Valley of Roncal and the Sierra de Lokiz, both of them situated in Navarre, arranged across several levels the management and use of grazing pastures and forests by the 14th century. |
| Keywords: | collective action, nesting principle, commons, regulations, conflicts |
| JEL: | D23 D71 D74 N53 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:seh:wpaper:1307&r=his |
| By: | Sergey Matveev (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). The Poletaev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities (IGITI). Research assistant) |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews the “middle class” concept based on Francois Guizot’s memoirs. It is presented here as the results of his research and political activities. The author pays much attention to the historical and intellectual context, as well as the concept’s genetic relationship with the preceding and consequent traditions in its development |
| Keywords: | Francois Guizot, sociology of class, middle class, memoirs, Restoration period, doctrinaires, history of ideas |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:36hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Alberto Feenstra |
| Abstract: | During the eighteenth century the VOC imported over a billion small copper coins (doits) to Java, which is a remarkable operation for the world’s largest enterprise at that time, since these coins were unfit to pay for the company’s wholesale trade. This paper argues that the VOC responded to Java’s specific need for small coins, because people increasingly relied on the market for daily necessities and became less dependent on subsistence farming. The alternative explanations of population growth, substitution and inflation do not satisfactorily explain the increased demand for these copper doits. Therefore, this paper proposes that Java’s economy underwent a transformation, particularly after 1750. |
| Keywords: | Economic History, Money Suppply, Economic growth, Indonesia, Java |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0049&r=his |
| By: | Pavel Sokolov (Pavel Sokolov is research assistant at Poletayev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities and lecturer at the Faculty of History, Higher School of Economics, Moscow.) |
| Abstract: | The article deals with the syncretic construction of fact which took shape in Early Modern Times at an intersection of biblical exegesis, political science, esthetics, historiography and natural sciences epistemology. The study attempts a comparative analysis of Giambattista Vico’s ‘new science’ and John Toland’s ‘travesty philosophy’, outlining shared reference points and structural similarities in their political epistemology: procedure of the authorization of facts, modal implications of the fact, economy of political dissimulation |
| Keywords: | history of humanities, objectivity, historical fact, scienza nuova, esthetics of originality, Newtonian exegesis, ragion di Stato. |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:25hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Cinnirella, Francesco (Ifo Institute, CESifo and CEPR); Hornung, Erik (Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Financez) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the effect of landownership concentration on school enrollment for nineteenth century Prussia. Prussia is an interesting laboratory given its decentralized educational system and the presence of heterogeneous agricultural institutions. We find that landownership concentration, a proxy for the institution of serfdom, has a negative effect on schooling. This effect diminishes substantially towards the end of the century. Causality of this relationship is confirmed by introducing soil texture to identify exogenous farm-size variation. Panel estimates further rule out unobserved heterogeneity. We present several robustness checks which shed some light on possible mechanisms. |
| Keywords: | Land concentration, Institutions, Serfdom, Peasants' emancipation, Education, Prussian economic history |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:warwcg:174&r=his |
| By: | Antonina Sharova (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia); Department of History; associate professor) |
| Abstract: | This article examines the biography of the historian Alexander Nikolaevich Savin (1873-1923), a specialist in English agrarian history of the 16th and 17th centuries. Based on archival sources, the published and unpublished writings of the historian, reminiscences about him, his diaries and his correspondence, this article focuses on the significance of two countries–Great Britain and Russia—for his personal and intellectual life |
| Keywords: | A. N. Savin, historian, agrarian history, Unwin, Maitland, Moscow University |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:20hum2013&r=his |
| By: | David I. Stern; Frank Jotzo; Leo Dobes |
| Abstract: | We review the historical literature on the economics of climate change with a focus on the evolution of the literature from some of the early classic papers to the latest contributions. We divide the paper into three main sections: trends in greenhouse gas emissions, mitigation, and adaptation. |
| Keywords: | Economics, climate change, emissions trends, mitigation, adaptation |
| JEL: | Q54 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:een:ccepwp:1307&r=his |
| By: | Wahl, Fabian |
| Abstract: | This study empirically establishes a link between medieval trade, agglomeration and contemporary regional development in ten European countries. It documents a statistically and economically significant positive relationship between prominent involvement in medieval trade and commercial activities and regional economic development today. Further empirical analyses show that medieval trade positively influenced city development both during the medieval period and in the long run; they also reveal a robust connection between medieval city growth and contemporary regional agglomeration and industry concentration. A mediation analysis indicates that a long-lasting effect of medieval trade on contemporary regional development is indeed transmitted via its effect on agglomeration and industry concentration. This research thus highlights the long-run importance of medieval trade in shaping the development of cities as well as the contemporary spatial distribution of economic activity throughout Europe. The path-dependent regional development processes caused by medieval commercial activities help explain the observed persistent regional development differences across the European countries considered. -- |
| Keywords: | Medieval Trade,Agglomeration,Regional Economic Development,Path-Dependency,New Economic Geography |
| JEL: | F14 N73 N93 O18 R12 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:fziddp:822013&r=his |
| By: | Chilosi, David; Federico, Giovanni |
| Abstract: | This paper contributes to the debate on globalization and the great divergence with a comprehensive analysis of trends, causes and effects of the integration of Asia in the world market from 1800 to the eve of World War Two, based on a newly compiled data-set. The analysis finds that: most price convergence occurred before 1870, with only little disintegration in the inter-war years; market integration was determined to a large extent by the fall of Western trading monopolies; it implied significant static welfare gains and emerges as a major cause of substantial improvements in the terms of trade. |
| JEL: | B1 O53 N0 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:54574&r=his |
| By: | Ivan Boldyrev (National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow/Humboldt University, Berlin.); Martin Kragh (Stockholm School of Economics/Uppsala Centre for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Uppsala University) |
| Abstract: | Research within the history of economic thought has focused only little on the development of economics under dictatorship. This paper attempts to show how a country with a relatively large and internationally established community of social scientists in the 1920s, the Soviet Union, was subjected to repression. We tell this story through the case of Isaak Il’ich Rubin, a prominent Russian economist and historian of economic thought, who in the late 1920s was denounced by rival scholars and repressed by the political system. By focusing not only on his life and work, but also that of his opponents and institutional clashes, we show how the decline of a social science tradition in Russia and the USSR emerged as a process over time. We analyze the complex interplay of ideas, scholars and their institutional context, and conclude that subsequent repression was arbitrary, suggesting that no clear survival or career strategy existed in the Stalinist system due to a situation of fundamental uncertainty. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how the Stalinization of Soviet social sciences occurred as a process over time. |
| Keywords: | Marxology, Soviet economic thought, political persecution, Stalinism. |
| JEL: | B24 B31 P26 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:17hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Gabriele Cappelli |
| Abstract: | - The present paper explores the role of public policy in the development of Italy’s human capital in the late 19th century and the Interwar period. It aims at understanding whether a system of decentralized primary education slowed down regional convergence in schooling. This work puts forward the hypothesis that, under such a system, the country was subject to a human capital trap – since poor and backward areas could not afford to invest a suitable amount of resources in schooling. Additionally, it investigates whether a more centralized system, introduced in 1911, loosened up the trap, fostered the accumulation of human capital and reduced the country’s regional disparities. Original qualitative evidence and new data on schooling confirm the existence of such a trap, and underline the positive role of centralization in the Interwar period. The econometric model implemented strengthens these findings: poor regions could not improve the quality of education, which in turn would give rise to a vicious circle. Centralized primary education certainly fostered the development of Italy’s schooling in the Interwar period. However, human capital regional disparities across the country persisted, a result that calls for further research on the topic. |
| JEL: | I22 I25 I28 N33 N43 O15 O20 |
| Date: | 2013–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:usi:wpaper:688&r=his |
| By: | Irina Shilnikova (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia); Faculty of Economics; Associate Professor) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the main measures taken to stimulate textile workers during the years of “War Communism” and the New Economic Policy and identifies the dynamics of the roles of the main elements of the labour stimulation system (compensation, coercion, and commitment). We discover what stimuli proved to be the most efficient during “War Communism” and the New Economic Policy. We analyse whether there was succession in the industrial labour stimulation system in pre-revolutionary (1880-1914) and Soviet (1918-1929) Russia and how actively Soviet managers employed the best practices of the pre-revolutionary factory administration. This paper also analyses the question of new practices introduced in the changing political and socio-economic circumstances. This paper is mainly based on archival sources. |
| Keywords: | Soviet Russia, “War Communism”, New Economic Policy, labor motivation, textile industry. |
| JEL: | N34 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:23hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Bjerkholt, Olav (Dept. of Economics, University of Oslo) |
| Abstract: | The article reviews the early history of the Cowles Commission, its close and intertwined relations with the Econometric Society (ES), and the influence and guidance of Ragnar Frisch. It provides much detail on the three rounds of choosing a research director, in 1937-38, in 1939 and at the end of 1942. Haavelmo’s work in the early 1940s came to play a major role for the econometric research at the Cowles Commission under Jacob Marschak as research director 1943-48. The article points to the importance of Abraham Wald and Jacob Marschak for the success of Haavelmo’s venture and its influence and tells the story of how it came about that Haavelmo’s ideas were adopted, applied and disseminated by the Cowles Commission. Thus the mention of Trygve Haavelmo in the title is referring also to his econometric ideas. The ideas themselves and their further evolvement at the CC have been a dominating theme in the history of econometrics literature, e.g. Hildreth (1986), Epstein (1987), Morgan (1990), Qin (1993) and Christ (1994). The article discusses the recruitment, the inner workings and various other concerns of the Cowles econometricians, from Marxism to Black Magic. It recounts at some length the efforts made by Marschak to recruit Abraham Wald to the University of Chicago and the Cowles Commission. The article can be read as a sequel to Bjerkholt (2005, 2007). |
| Keywords: | Trygve Haavelmo; Cowles Commission for Research in Economics |
| JEL: | B23 |
| Date: | 2013–11–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:osloec:2013_026&r=his |
| By: | Vadim Khramov; John Ridings Lee |
| Abstract: | Existing economic indicators and indexes assess economic activity but no single indicator measures the general macro-economic performance of a nation, state, or region in a methodologically simple and intuitive way. This paper proposes a simple, yet informative metric called the Economic Performance Index (EPI). The EPI represents a step toward clarity, by combining data on inflation, unemployment, government deficit, and GDP growth into a single indicator. In contrast to other indexes, the EPI does not use complicated mathematical procedures but was designed for simplicity, making it easier for professionals and laypeople alike to understand and apply to the economy. To maximize ease of understanding, we adopt a descriptive grading system. In addition to a Raw EPI that gives equal weights to its components, we construct a Weighted EPI and show that both indexes perform similarly for U.S. data. To demonstrate the validity of the EPI, we conduct a review of U.S. history from 1790 to 2012. We show that the EPI reflects the major events in U.S. history, including wars, periods of economic prosperity and booms, along with economic depressions, recessions, and even panics. Furthermore, the EPI not only captures official recessions over the past century but also allows for measuring and comparing their relative severity. Even though the EPI is simple by its construction, we show that its dynamics are similar to those of the Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) and The Conference Board Coincident Economic Index® (CEI). |
| Keywords: | Economic indicators;Economic growth;Inflation;Budget deficits;Unemployment;Gross domestic product;Economic Index, Indicator, Economic Performance. |
| Date: | 2013–10–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:imf:imfwpa:13/214&r=his |
| By: | Oleg Voskoboynikov (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia); Department of History; associate professor.) |
| Abstract: | The twelfth century is a period of intense search in all fields of culture and religion, a period of great curiosity. But the curiosity, an ambiguous term and psychological attitude, was for centuries, since Augustin, banished as a dangerous sin. This ascetic perception of goals and methods of human knowledge, not a mere agnosticism, came to compete with a new mundana sapientia, an appeal to philosophical inquiry, to reception of scientific texts from Arabs and Ancients, represented by some «innovators» (Abaelard, Hermann of Carinthia, Thierry of Chartres etc.). In this article, ideas promoted by them are sequentially compared to the voices of some «retrogrades», like Peter Damiani or Bernard of Clairvaux. This comparison leads us to a better understanding of the age of «sic et non», an epoch of constant dialogue and dispute |
| Keywords: | Curiosity, sin, medieval theology, Bernard of Clairvaux, Peter Damiani, William of Conches, Dante, Frederick II, scholasticism |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:30hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Cingolani, Luciana (UNU-MERIT / MGSoG) |
| Abstract: | What is state capacity and how does it affect development? The concept of state capacity acquired centrality during the late seventies and eighties, sponsored by a rather compact set of scholarly works. It later permeated through several disciplines and has now earned a place within the many governance dimensions affecting economic performance. The present article aims to provide a historical account of the evolution and usage of the state capacity concept, along with its various operationalizations. It examines in particular: a) the growing distance in the usage of the concept by different disciplinary and thematic fields; b) the process of `branching out' of the concept from restricted to more multidimensional definitions; c) the problems with construct validity and concept stretching, and d) the generalized lack of clarity that exists regarding the institutional sources of state capacity. |
| Keywords: | state capacity, statebuilding, fiscal performance, bureaucracies, neopatrimonialism |
| JEL: | D73 D74 H10 H20 O43 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unm:unumer:2013053&r=his |
| By: | Carol H. Shiue |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the pre-industrial origins of modern-day fertility decline. The setting is in Anhwei Province, China over the 13th to 19th centuries, a period well before the onset of China’s demographic transition and industrialization. There are four main results. First, we observe non-Malthusian effects in which high income households had relatively fewer children. Second, higher income households had relatively more educated sons, consistent with their greater ability to support major educational investments. Third, those households that invested in education had fewer children, suggesting that households producing educated children were reallocating resources away from child quantity and towards child quality. Fourth, over time, demand for human capital fell significantly. The most plausible reason is the declining returns to educational investments. The findings point to a role for demography in explaining China’s failure to industrialize early on. |
| JEL: | I25 J11 O15 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19661&r=his |
| By: | Riccardo De Bonis (Bank of Italy); Andrea Silvestrini (Bank of Italy) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we investigate the main features of the Italian financial cycle, extracted by means of a structural trend-cycle decomposition of the credit-to-GDP ratio, using annual observations from 1861 to 2011. In order to draw conclusions based on solid historical data, we provide a thorough reconstruction of the key balance-sheet time series of Italian banks, considering all the main assets and liabilities over the last 150 years. We come to three main conclusions. First, while there was a close correlation between loans and deposits (relative to GDP) until the mid-1970s, over the last 30 years this link has become more tenuous, and the volume of loans has increased in relation to deposits. The banks have covered this “funding gap†mainly by issuing new debt securities. Second, the Italian financial cycle has a much longer duration than traditional business cycles. Third, taking into account the deviation of the credit-to-GDP ratio from its trend, an acceleration of credit preceded a banking crisis in 8 out of the 12 episodes listed by Reinhart and Rogoff (2009). A Logit regression confirms a positive association between the probability of a banking crisis and a previous acceleration of the credit-to-GDP gap. However, there were also periods - such as the early 1970s - in which the growth of the credit-to-GDP ratio was not followed by a banking crisis. |
| Keywords: | banking system, credit-to-GDP ratio, financial cycle, unobserved components. |
| JEL: | C22 C82 E32 E44 G01 N10 |
| Date: | 2013–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_936_13&r=his |
| By: | Roberto Foa (Department of Government, Harvard University. 1737 Cambridge St, Cambridge, MA 02138.); Anna Nemirovskaya (Laboratory for Comparative Social Research, National Research University Higher School of Economics. Vasilievsky Ostrov 3, Line 10, room 308, St Petersburg, Russia); Elena Mostovova (Laboratory for Comparative Social Research, National Research University Higher School of Economics. Vasilievsky Ostrov 3, Line 10, room 308, St Petersburg, Russia.) |
| Abstract: | One of the attributes most consistently highlighted in the literature on frontier society is the tendency to spontaneous social organisation. However, despite the resilience of the ‘frontier thesis’ within sociology and political science, it has not been subject to a rigorous empirical examination. Does it constitute a description of the social norms and institution of the western United States, or is it one manifestation of a more general ‘frontier phenomenon’, found in other times and places? In order to answer these questions, this article examines data on the nature of social relations in frontier zones in four countries: Brazil, Russia, Canada and the United States. Taking a wide range of survey items, we find that higher levels of voluntary activity, social trust, tolerance of outgroups, and civic protest are distinctive features of frontier life, and not simply a feature of the American historical experience. |
| Keywords: | Social institutions, social capital, settlement patterns, historical institutionalism, frontier thesis |
| JEL: | Z13 N90 R23 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:09/soc/2013&r=his |
| By: | Sophia Du Plessis, Ada Jansen and Dieter von Fintel |
| Abstract: | The question about the productivity of slavery is a strongly debated issue, for example in the USA the seminal work by Engerman and Fogel (1974), “Time on the Crossâ€, sparked a flurry of publications debating the issue from different angles. The debate about the economic worth of slaves in the Cape of Good Hope already started with Pasques de Chavonnes (the only member of the Council of Policy who opposed the principle of using slave labour) who in 1717 remarked that slavery would inhibit economic development since ‘the money spent on slavery is dead money’. In this paper we provide an overview of slave prices and the value of their marginal productivity in the Cape Colony and ultimately we ask whether Cape slavery was “dead moneyâ€. Our approach is to estimate a hedonic price function for slaves in the Cape Colony for the time period 1700-1725 using the Changing Hands database, and comparing these with slave productivity estimates from the opgaafrollen. The initial price paid for a slave is, by conjecture, constituted by current marginal productivity of slaves plus the expected net present value of slave characteristics (which by implication will yield productivity returns in the future). These productive characteristics include gender, age and origin. We furthermore investigate whether the gradual increase in slave prices was driven by overall price levels in the economy, by the importation of “better quality†slaves over time or by the policy induced change in demand for labour away from European wage labour to slave labour. Lastly, we investigate whether slave prices matched the value of their marginal product by comparing estimates of the hedonic price series with estimates of marginal productivity. Real prices track marginal productivity closely, suggesting that slavery was profitable over most of the period. However, this effect is heterogeneous, with small farmers showing no signs of profitability and the opposite for large farmers. Small farmers attempted to mimic the production process of large farmers unsuccessfully, and consequently many impoverished farmers had made over-investments in slavery. |
| Keywords: | Slave prices, productivity |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rza:wpaper:385&r=his |
| By: | Bas van Leeuwen; Jieli van Leeuwen-Li; Reinhard Pirngruber |
| Abstract: | In recent years interest in welfare levels in ancient economies has increased considerably partly as a result of a quest to find the start of modern economic growth. These welfare levels can be calculated in two ways. First, it can be done using GDP per capita, capturing average income in a society. However, this tells us little about actual welfare of people at the bottom of the income distribution. Therefore, recently the focus has shifted towards so-called welfare ratios where the wage of an unskilled labourer is compared with the price of a basket of goods. In this paper we present new estimates for Han China and Babylonia as well as modifying existing estimates for Egypt and the Roman Empire to make them comparable. We find that the agricultural regions of Egypt and Babylonia had the lowest welfare ratios. Since in all societies unskilled workers in antiquity belonged to the bottom 80% of the income distribution, these figures are comparable. This only changed in the 14th century when in some Northwestern European countries the relative position of labourers in the income distribution deteriorated even though their welfare ratio’s increased marking a start of the Great Divergence. |
| Keywords: | Welfare, China, Seleucid Empire, Roman Empire, wages, prices, labourer |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0045&r=his |
| By: | Peter Foldvari; Bas van Leeuwen; Dimitry Didenko |
| Abstract: | According to the consensus view it was physical capital accumulation that primarily drove economic growth during the early socialist period. Growth models incorporating both human and physical capital accumulation (Caballe and Santos 1993, Barro and Sala-i-Martin 2004) lead to the conclusion that a high physical/human capital ratio can cause a lower economic growth in the long-run. In this paper we show theoretically and empirically that according to the logic of the socialist planner, it was optimal to achieve a higher physical to human capital ratio in socialist countries than in the West. Using a VAR analysis, we find empirical confirmation that within the Material Product System of national accounting the relative dominance of investment in physical capital accumulation relative to human capital was indeed more efficient than under an SNA system of national accounts. |
| Keywords: | central planning, capital accumulation, human capital, Soviet Union, national accounts. |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0048&r=his |
| By: | Elena Vishlenkova (National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). Poletaev Institute for Theoretical and Historical Studies in the Humanities (IGITI). Deputy Director) |
| Abstract: | This article is a reconstruction of archival policies pursued by Russian universities in the nineteenth century and their effects. By comparing ‘old’ and ‘new’ archive inventories, archivists’ records and ministerial instructions, Elena Vishlenkova detects sets of documents that were destroyed in the ministerial and university archives. Furthermore, the author explains the logic of keeping certain types of documents and assigning them specific addresses within the archives. The study explains the contradictions that exist in the source evidence as well as in researchers’ conclusions, and presents hitherto unknown aspects of the university culture in the Russian Empire |
| Keywords: | Russian Universities, the Russian Empire, paperwork, cultural practice, autonomy, identity, corporation, solidarity, profession |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:29hum2013&r=his |
| By: | Gihleb, Rania (Boston University); Giuntella, Osea (University of Oxford) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the causal effects of Catholic schooling on educational attainment. Using a novel instrumental-variable approach that exploits an exogenous shock to the Catholic school system, we show that the positive correlation between Catholic schooling and student outcomes is explained by selection bias. Spearheaded by the universal call to holiness and the opening to lay leadership, the reforms that occurred at the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II) in the early 1960s produced a dramatic exogenous change in the cost/benefit ratio of religious life in the Catholic Church. The decline in vocations that followed contributed to a significant increase in costs and, in many cases, to the closure of Catholic schools. We document that this decline was heterogeneous across US dioceses, and that it was more marked in those dioceses governed by a liberal bishop. Merging diocesan data drawn from the Official Catholic Directory (1960-1980) and the US Census, we show that that the variation in the supply of female religious teachers across US dioceses is strongly related to Catholic schooling. Using the abrupt decline in female vocations as an instrument for Catholic schooling, we find no evidence of positive effects on student outcomes. |
| Keywords: | Catholic schools, instrumental variable, selection |
| JEL: | I20 J24 N3 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7753&r=his |
| By: | Klein, Alexander (School of Economics, University of Kent); Ogilvie, Sheilagh (Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge) |
| Abstract: | A shift in occupational structure towards non-agricultural activities is widely viewed as a key component of European economic growth during the early modern ‘Little Divergence’. Yet little is known about this process in those parts of eastern-central Europe that experienced the early modern ‘second serfdom’, the massive increase in the institutional powers of landlords over the rural population. We analyze non-agricultural occupations under the second serfdom using data on 6,983 Bohemian villages in 1654. Bohemia resembled other eastern-central, nordic and southern European economies in having a lower percentage of non-agricultural activities than western Europe. But Bohemian serfs engaged in a wide array of industrial and commercial activities whose intensity varied significantly with village characteristics. Nonagricultural activity showed a significant positive relationship with village size, pastoral agriculture, sub-peasant social strata, Jews, freemen, female household heads, and village mills, and a significant negative relationship with arable agriculture and urban agglomerations. Non-agricultural activity was also positively associated with landlord presence in the village, although the relationship turned negative at higher values and landlord presence reversed the positive effects of female headship and mills. Under the second serfdom, landlords encouraged serf activities from which they could extort rents, while stifling others which threatened their interests. |
| Keywords: | occupational structure, non-agricultural activities, Czech |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:warwcg:175&r=his |
| By: | Alexandra M. de Pleijt; Jan Luiten van Zanden |
| Abstract: | The Little Divergence is the process of differential economic growth within Europe in the period between 1300 and 1800, during which the North Sea Area developed into the most prosperous and dynamic part of the Continent. We test various hypotheses about the causes of the Little Divergence, using new data and focusing on trends in GDP per capita. The results are that institutional changes (in particular the rise of active Parliaments), human capital formation and structural change are the primary drivers of the growth that occurred, which contrast sharply with previous findings by Robert Allen (who however focused on real wages as dependent variable). We also test for the role of religion (the spread of Protestantism): this has affected human capital formation, but does not in itself have an impact on growth. Moreover, we find an insignificant effect of the land-labour ratio, which shows the limitations of the Malthusian model for understanding the Little Divergence. |
| Keywords: | Europe, economic growth, Little Divergence, institutional change |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0046&r=his |
| By: | Sequeira, Tiago; Santos, Marcelo; Ferreira-Lopes, Alexandra |
| Abstract: | The reasons why inventions that shaped industrial revolutions, occurred in the UK and in the USA, have been suggested by economic historians. For the first time,we access the determinants of more than a hundred inventions around the world, explaining why they occurred in a given country and why some occurred earlier than others. We confirm the importance of scale effects and dismiss the importance of education as triggers of inventions. Geographic and genetic distance from the UK and the USA have proven to be significant in explaining inventions. Both distance from the UK and proximity to the USA seem to have significant effect on the rise of the probability to invent and on the probability to invent earlier. |
| Keywords: | Inventions; Industrial Revolutions; TFP; Determinants of Development |
| JEL: | I25 N10 N30 O10 O50 Z1 Z10 |
| Date: | 2013–11–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:51553&r=his |
| By: | Frédéric DOCQUIER (UNIVERSITE CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES) and FNRS) |
| Abstract: | This chapter describes how institutional quality can be measured, quantifies the correlation between institutional and economic developments, and reviews and discusses the literature on the causal impact of institutions on growth. Identifying a causal effect of institutions on development, and understanding the technology of the transmission of institutional quality to growth are challenging issues. This is due to the difficulty (i) of disentangling the causal and reversing the causal effects, (ii) of accounting for unobserved shocks affecting both institutions and growth, and (iii) of capturing the lag structure of the relationship. To address these problems, existing cross-country studies have instrumented institutional quality using variables reflecting the settlement decisions of colonizers and imperial powers between the 16th and the 19th century. While fully recognizing the merits and the methodological rigor of this literature, I show that the type of institution implemented by imperial powers was statistically linked to unobserved factors affecting long-run economic performance. Hence, the quantitative predictions of these studies must be used with caution. Alternatively, collecting long-run data on institutional and economic changes, and searching for quasi-natural experiments (comparing the dynamics of countries which were initially similar and experienced different, unexpected institutional shocks) are promising research avenues. |
| Date: | 2013–11–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ctl:louvir:2013030&r=his |
| By: | Olga Alonso-Villar (Universidade de Vigo); Coral del Rio (Universidade de Vigo and EQUALITAS) |
| Abstract: | Based on harmonized and detailed occupation titles and making use of measures that do not require pair-wise comparisons among demographic groups, this paper shows that the occupational segregation of Black women dramatically declined from 1940 to 1980 (especially in the 1960s and 1970s), it slightly decreased from 1980 to 2000, and it remained stagnated in the first decade of the 21st century. To assess the reduction in segregation, this paper extends recent measures that penalize the concentration of Black women in low-paid jobs and finds that the integration process slightly reversed after 2000. Regarding the role that education has played, this study highlights that only from 1990 onward, Black women with either some college or university degrees have lower segregation (as compared with their peers) than those with lower education. Nevertheless, in 2010, Black women with university degrees still tend to concentrate in occupations that have wages below the average wage of occupations that high-skilled workers fill. |
| Keywords: | occupational segregation, local segregation measures, race, gender, Black women, status, wages, United States. |
| JEL: | J15 J16 J71 D63 |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2013-304&r=his |
| By: | Robartus J. van der Spek; Bas van Leeuwen |
| Abstract: | In this paper we try to analyse market efficiency during the Seleucid and Parthian era in the Babylonian Empire. We find that prices in Babylon were less correlated with those in Rome than of most other regions around the Mediterranean. This suggests that Rome was indeed the urban centre of the Roman Empire and it also suggests that extensive trade (and/or tribute) relations existed around the Mediterranean Sea. Babylon, however, was located far away from direct sea or land trade routes. In addition, it produced largely barley (because of salinization of the soil) which was the less preferred grain around the Mediterranean. The price in Babylon remained relatively low, however, because of its productive agriculture and because barley has less nutritional value per litre than wheat. This lack of trade meant that markets were more sensitive to external shocks. Markets could not cope with external supply or demand shocks by means of imports (or exports). This increased volatility, as described by Persson, means less efficient markets. Indeed, we find that coefficient of variance of prices of staple crops was higher in Babylon than elsewhere, indicating less efficient markets. In addition, after a price shock, prices take a long to converge to their normal values. We find that for both barley and dates the expected average duration of a deviation of the price was considerable, varying between 9.5 months and 3.5 years. This suggest that often there may be autocorrelation, that is that bad harvest in year t may lead to a bad harvest in year t+1 because of lack of storage and lack of seed. Equally, recovery to normal prices seems largely to take place during a harvest instead of in between harvests. Hence, the relatively long duration of high prices and the lack of recovery in between harvests suggest the absence of substantial imports. Quick recovery was possible, though, and this must be related then to the fertility of the land, which allowed abundant harvests, and not to imports from afar. On occasion relief could be effected by short distance trade (e.g. from Uruk or the Diyala region) if famine was caused by a very local problem which only affected the city of Babylon and its close environment. |
| Keywords: | Babylon, Rome, trade, price volatility |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0047&r=his |
| By: | Clark, Gregory; Cummins, Neil |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a panel of 21,618 people with rare surnames whose wealth is observed at death in England and Wales 1858-2012 to measure the intergeneration elasticity of wealth over five generations. We show, using rare surnames to track families, that wealth is much more persistent over generations than standard one generation estimates would suggest. There is still a significant correlation between the wealth of families five generations apart. We show that this finding can be reconciled with standard estimates of wealth mobility by positing an underlying Markov process of wealth inheritance with an intergenerational elasticity of 0.70-0.75 throughout the years 1858-2012. The enormous social and economic changes of this long period had surprisingly little effect on the strength of inheritance of wealth. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational social mobility; inequality; family economics; education |
| JEL: | Z10 N0 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:54515&r=his |
| By: | Donna Feir (Department of Economics, University of Victoria) |
| Abstract: | For decades in North America and Australia, indigenous children were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in boarding schools. These schools had the stated goal of cultural assimilation and are perceived to have been an educational failure. I offer the first causal evidence on the long run effects of these schools using the interaction of changes in Canadian national policy and variation in the power of the Catholic Church. I find that the average boarding school had substantial effects on both cultural and economic assimilation. However, I find suggestive evidence that highly abusive schools only affected cultural connection. |
| Keywords: | Assimilation, Boarding Schools, North American Indians |
| JEL: | I20 I24 I25 I28 I38 J01 J15 J18 Z00 |
| Date: | 2013–11–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:vic:vicddp:1301&r=his |
| By: | Cummins, Neil; Clark, Gregory |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a panel of 21,618 people with rare surnames whose wealth is observed at death in England and Wales 1858-2012 to measure the intergeneration elasticity of wealth over five generations. We show, using rare surnames to track families, that wealth is much more persistent over generations than standard one generation estimates would suggest. There is still a significant correlation between the wealth of families five generations apart. We show that this finding can be reconciled with standard estimates of wealth mobility by positing an underlying Markov process of wealth inheritance with an intergenerational elasticity of 0.70-0.75 throughout the years 1858-2012. The enormous social and economic changes of this long period had surprisingly little effect on the strength of inheritance of wealth. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational social mobility; inequality; family economics; education |
| JEL: | N0 I3 |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:54513&r=his |