The explanations offered for the contrasting records of long-run growth and development among the societies of North and South America most often focus on institutions. The traditional explanations for the sources of these differences in institutions, typically highlight the significance of national heritage or religion. We, in contrast, argue that a hemispheric perspective across the wide range of colonies established in the New World by the Europeans suggests that although there were many influences, factor endowments or initial conditions had profound and enduring effects on the long-run paths of institutional and economic development followed by the respective economies.

https://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.14.3.217

History Lessons Institutions, Factor Endowments, and Paths of Development in the New World

The Modern World-System I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century

Existing studies establish a strong cross-country correlation between income and democracy but do not control for factors that simultaneously affect both variables. We show that controlling for such factors by including country fixed effects removes the statistical association between income per capita and vari- ous measures of democracy. We present instrumental-variables estimates that also show no causal effect of income on democracy. The cross-country corre - lation between income and democracy reflects a positive correlation between changes in income and democracy over the past 500 years. This pattern is con - sistent with the idea that societies embarked on divergent political-economic development paths at certain critical junctures. (JEL D7�, E�1)

Income and Democracy

Whereas traditional explanations of differen ces in long-run paths of development acrossthe Americas generally point to the significance of differences in national heritage or religion,we highlight the relevance of stark contrasts in the degree of inequality in wealth, human capital,and political power in accounting for how fundame ntal economic institutions evolved over time.We argue, moreover, that the roots of these disparities in the extent of inequality lay indifferences in the initial factor endowments (dating back to the era of European colonization).We document -- through comparative studies of suffrage, public land, and schooling policies --systematic patterns by which societies in the Am ericas that began with more extreme inequalityor heterogeneity in the population were more likely to develop institutional structures that greatlyadvantaged members of elite classes (and disa dvantaging the bulk of th e population) by providingthem with more political influence and access to economic opportunities. The clear implicationis that institutions should not be presumed to be exogenous; economists need to learn more aboutwhere they come from to understand their relation to economic development. Our findings notonly contribute to our knowledge of why extreme differences in the extent of inequality acrossNew World economies have persisted for centuries, but also to the study of processes of long-runeconomic growth past and present. Stanley L. Engerman Kenneth L. SokoloffDepartment of Economics Department of EconomicsUniversity of Rochester University of California, Los AngelesRochester, NY 14627 Los Angeles, CA 90095and NBER and NBERenge@troi.cc.rochester.edu sokoloff@ucla.edu

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Factor Endowments, Inequality, and Paths of Development among New World Economies

This article addresses the relationship between discourse, textual and social order, and power by means of an examination of the concept of genre. It begins with a critical review of the way genre has been used in linguistic anthropology. A distinction is delineated between approaches that take for granted the status of genre as a tool for classifying and ordering discourse and those that contend with elements of generic ambiguity and dynamism. Proceeding to outline a new approach to genre, the discussion analyzes a wide range of intertextual relations that are deployed in constituting generic links. A series of examples contrasts strategies for minimizing gaps between texts and generic precedents with strategies for maximizing such gaps. A final section points to the ways that investigating generic intertextuality can illuminate questions of ideology, political economy, and power.

Genre, Intertextuality, and Social Power

A monumental achievement of scholarship, this volume on the Nahua Indians of Central Mexico (often called Aztecs) constitutes our best understanding of any New World indigenous society in the period following European contact. Simply put, the purpose of this book is to throw light on the history of Nahua society and culture through the use of records in Nahuatl, concentrating on the time when the bulk of the extant documents were written, between about 1540-50 and the late eighteenth century. At the same time, the earliest records are full of implications for the very first years after contact, and ultimately for the preconquest epoch as well, both of which are touched on here in ways that are more than introductory or ancillary.

The Nahuas After the Conquest: A Social and Cultural History of the Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth Through Eighteenth Centuries

List of tables, figures and maps Preface Part I. The Context: 1. Iberian ways 2. Indigenous ways Part II. Origins and Early Maturity: 3. From islands to mainland: the Caribbean phase and subsequent conquests 4. Conquest society: central areas 5. Maturity in the Spanish Indies: central areas 6. Brazilian beginnings 7. Brazil in the sugar cane 8. The fringes Part III. Reorientations: 9. Late colonial times in the Spanish Indies 10. Brazil in the age of gold and absolutism 11. Epilogue: the coming of independence Bibliography Index.

Early Latin America: A History of Colonial Spanish America and Brazil

Spanish Peru, 1532-1560: A Colonial Society

W1 EHAT THE SPANISH COLONIAL PERIOD added to pre-Columbian America can be described briefly as the contents of two complementary master institutions, the Spanish city and the great estate. Historians have now begun to penetrate deeply into these subjects, and soon it will be possible to deal with Spanish American colonial history from its vital center rather than from its surface or periphery. While the colonial city is the less well explored of the two themes, its study can proceed on a firm footing, since the continuity of location, function, and even formal organization must be evident to all. Understanding the great estate has proved more difficult, for the estate had a greater diversity of forms and changed more than the city, both in law and in substance. The most serious problem, not always recognized as such, has been the apparent lack of connection between the encomienda of the Conquest period and the hacienda of the mature colony. Earlier in this century some scholars assumed, quite logically, that the encomienda must have evolved directly into the hacienda. The restricted rights of the encomendero were thought to have become gradually confused with land possession through some process never revealed in detail. Then in a series of publications written mainly during the 1930s, Silvio Zavala and Lesley B. Simpson proved to general satisfaction that this identification was false.' The encomienda had no juridical connection with land, and as time passed, it grew weaker rather than stronger, until, in Mexico at least, it was little more than an annuity. Most historians today would no doubt agree that there is some sort of equivalence between encomienda and hacienda, as well as a

/pdf/encomienda-and-hacienda-the-evolution-of-the-great-estate-in-20bytlhov9.pdf

Encomienda and Hacienda: The Evolution of the Great Estate in the Spanish Indies

Historians are concerned today that the Spaniards' early accounts of their first experiences with the Indians in the Americas should be balanced with accounts from the Indian perspective. "We People Here" reflects that concern, bringing together important and revealing documents written in the Nahuatl language in 16th century Mexico. James Lockhart's superior translation combines contemporary English with the most up-to-date, nuanced understanding of Nahuatl grammar and meaning. The foremost Nahuatl conquest account is Book Twelve of the Florentine Codex. In this monumental work, Fray Bernardino de Sahagun commissioned Nahuas to collect and record in their own language accounts of the conquest of Mexico; he then added a parallel Spanish account that is part summary, part elaboration of the Nahuatl. Now, for the first time, the Nahuatl and Spanish texts are together in one volume with "en face" English translations and reproductions of the copious illustrations from the Codex. Also included are five other Nahua conquest texts. Lockhart's introduction discusses each one individually, placing the narratives in context.

James Lockhart

Papers

The Nahuas After the Conquest: A Social and Cultural History of the Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth Through Eighteenth Centuries

Early Latin America: A History of Colonial Spanish America and Brazil

Spanish Peru, 1532-1560: A Colonial Society

Encomienda and Hacienda: The Evolution of the Great Estate in the Spanish Indies

We People Here: Nahuatl Accounts of The Conquest of Mexico