Showing papers in "The Economic History Review in 2009"
TL;DR: A second Industrious Revolution? Appendix I.1. The transformation of consumer desire in the long eighteenth century 2. The origins of the Industrious revolution 3. The Industrial Revolution: the supply of labor 4. The industrial revolution: consumer demand 5. The breadwinner-homemaker household 6.
Abstract: 1. The transformation of consumer desire in the long eighteenth century 2. The origins of the Industrious Revolution 3. The Industrious Revolution: the supply of labor 4. The Industrious Revolution: consumer demand 5. The breadwinner-homemaker household 6. A second Industrious Revolution? Appendix I.
267 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a survey of the state of the arts in London and the date 2008 unless otherwise stated, where the place of publication is London, UK and the year 2008 is 2008.
Abstract: (The place of publication is London and the date 2008 unless otherwise stated.)
158 citations
TL;DR: The authors reviewed the ways in which historians and economists have applied the term "globalization" to the early modern era, distinguishing a soft and a hard definition, and went on to test the claims made about the driving forces shaping the growth and character of long-distance trade between Europe and Asia in the age of the European trading companies.
Abstract: This article reviews the ways in which historians and economists have applied the term ‘globalization’ to the early modern era. It distinguishes a soft and a hard definition, and goes on to test the claims made about the driving forces shaping the growth and character of long-distance trade between Europe and Asia in the age of the European trading companies. On the basis of new estimates of the volume and value of European trade with Asia, the article concludes by identifying the factors limiting the growth of trade in this period.
107 citations
TL;DR: In the early eighteenth century, wages in Britain were more than four times as high as in India, the world's major exporter of cotton textiles as discussed by the authors, which induced the adoption of more capital-intensive production methods in Britain and a faster rate of technological progress, so that competitive advantage had begun to shift in Britain's favour by the late eighteenth century.
Abstract: In the early eighteenth century, wages in Britain were more than four times as high as in India, the world's major exporter of cotton textiles. This induced the adoption of more capital-intensive production methods in Britain and a faster rate of technological progress, so that competitive advantage had begun to shift in Britain's favour by the late eighteenth century. However, the completion of the process was delayed until after the Napoleonic Wars by increasing raw cotton costs, before supply adjusted to the major increase in demand for inputs.
96 citations
TL;DR: The productivity of agriculture in England and the Yangtze Delta are compared c.1620 and c.1820 in order to gauge the performance of the most advanced part of China vis-a-vis its counterpart in Europe.
Abstract: The productivity of agriculture in England and the Yangtze Delta are compared c.1620 and c.1820 in order to gauge the performance of the most advanced part of China vis-a-vis its counterpart in Europe. The value of real output is compared using purchasing power parity exchange rates. Output per hectare was nine times greater in the Yangtze Delta than in England. More surprisingly, output per day worked was about 90 per cent of the English performance. This put Yangtze farmers slightly behind English and Dutch farmers c.1820, but ahead of most other farmers in Europe—an impressive achievement. There was little change in Yangtze agricultural productivity between 1620 and 1820. In 1820, the real income of a Yangtze peasant family was also about the same as that of an English agricultural labourer. All was not rosy in the Yangtze, however, for incomes there were on a downward trajectory. Agriculture income per family declined between 1620 and 1820, even though income per day worked changed little since population growth led to smaller farms and fewer days worked per year. The real earnings of women in textile production also declined, since the relative price of cotton cloth dropped—possibly also because a larger population led to greater production. The implication is that the Yangtze family, unlike the English family, had a considerably higher real income c.1620, and that period was the Delta's golden age.
95 citations
TL;DR: In the later seventeenth century, material progress was first identified in England as a recent achievement with boundless future promise, and it was welcomed despite fears about the threats that it was perceived to present to national and personal well-being as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: In the later seventeenth century, material progress was first identified in England as a recent achievement with boundless future promise, and it was welcomed despite fears about the threats that it was perceived to present to national and personal well-being. The article investigates the roots of that confidence, and finds them in political economy and other intellectual developments that shaped interpretations of changing standards of living. The civic and moral ‘challenge of affluence’ was fully recognized but never resolved. Progress was accepted, and had to be defended in war-time, as the route to general happiness, ‘ease’, and plenty.
67 citations
60 citations
TL;DR: The emergence of the housewife in the Netherlands over the period 1812-1922 was strongly influenced by the social norm that women should withdraw from the labour market on the eve of marriage.
Abstract: The emergence of the housewife in the Netherlands over the period 1812–1922 was strongly influenced by the social norm that women should withdraw from the labour market on the eve of marriage. Adherence to this norm is most clearly reflected in the emergence of the housewife among the lower classes, especially at the close of the nineteenth century among wives of farmers. Women in urban municipalities, however, set the norm far earlier and differences across social classes were significantly greater in towns than in rural areas. Paradoxically, the rise of the housewife did not change work pressures for lower-class women.
49 citations
TL;DR: The authors examines the theory of ancient economic imperialism from three perspectives: as a good illustration of how modern developments, and theories, affect our vision of the past; as the theory that attempted to rationalize ancient imperialism in economic terms; and, finally, as the theoretical construction that eventually served as a springboard for many recent studies in ancient imperialism and ancient economies.
Abstract: societies as having been imperialistic in political terms and capitalistic in economic terms, thus explaining their policy as having been guided by economic interests. Both the emergence of this theory (in the late nineteenth century) and its eventual downfall, after only a few decades, are interesting for several reasons. This article examines the theory of ancient economic imperialism from three perspec tives: as a good illustration of how modern developments, and theories, affect our vision of the past; as the theory that attempted to rationalize ancient imperialism in economic terms; and, finally, as the theoretical construction that eventually served as a springboard for many recent studies in ancient imperialism and ancient economies.
46 citations
TL;DR: As a subterranean, highly elastic energy source, coal played a vital role in the cotton industry revolution, and Lancashire coal helped to shape the global pattern of cotton production.
Abstract: As a subterranean, highly elastic energy source, coal played a vital role in the cotton industry revolution. Coal was also vital to Lancashire's primacy in this revolution, because it was necessary both to the original accumulation of agglomeration economies before the steam age and to their reinforcement during the steam age. In no other part of the world was the cotton industry situated on a coalfield, and the response of other parts of the world cotton industry to Lancashire's agglomeration advantages was dispersal in search of cheap water and/or labour power. Lancashire coal helped to shape the global pattern of cotton production.
45 citations
TL;DR: Turnpike trusts increased property income in local areas by at least 20 per cent as discussed by the authors, which shed light on why local property owners promoted and managed turnpikes and contributed to the growth in real land rents between 1690 and 1815.
Abstract: Numerous Acts of Parliament changed the financing of transport infrastructure in eighteenth-century England This paper examines the economic effects of turnpike acts, which greatly improved road infrastructure by introducing tolls It shows that turnpike trusts increased property income in local areas by at least 20 per cent The findings shed light on why local property owners promoted and managed turnpikes They also show that turnpike trusts accounted for at least 20 per cent of the total growth in real land rents between 1690 and 1815, and added at least 165 per cent to national income in 1815
TL;DR: In this article, the authors measure ex post performance in terms of the time-weighted rate of return by making use of a new database of Congolese stocks and compare the Congolous data with a Belgian sample.
Abstract: Before the First World War, Belgium participated in a global wave of foreign direct investment. After the war, a shift towards the Belgian colony of the Congo was observed. With regard to these investments, it is commonly argued that higher (expected) profit rates were a strong incentive, although others propose that the colonial powers lost money on their colonial possessions. We measure ex post performance in terms of the time-weighted rate of return by making use of a new database of Congolese stocks and compare the Congolese data with a Belgian sample. Returns on Congolese stocks were much higher, at least until country risk became a reality.
TL;DR: Ribeiro et al. as discussed by the authors, 2010, Energy as an indicator of modernization in Latin America, 1890-1925, The Economic History Review, 63: 769-804, which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0289.00463.x.
Abstract: This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: RUBIO, M. d. M., YANEZ, C., FOLCHI, M. and CARRERAS, A. (2010), Energy as an indicator of modernization in Latin America, 1890–1925. The Economic History Review, 63: 769–804, which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2009.00463.x. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.
TL;DR: The unique culture that developed among the Tswana before and during the early days of colonialism appears to have contributed significantly to the factors widely seen as determinants of Botswana's post-colonial economic success.
Abstract: Cultural explanations of economic phenomena have recently enjoyed a renaissance among economists. This article provides further evidence for the salience of culture through an in-depth case study of one of the fastest-growing economies in the world during the last 50 years-Botswana. The unique culture that developed among the Tswana before and during the early days of colonialism, which shared many features with those of western nation-states, appears to have contributed significantly to the factors widely seen as determinants of Botswana's post-colonial economic success: state legitimacy, good governance and democracy, commercial traditions, well-established property rights, and inter-ethnic unity. Neighbouring Southern African cultures typically did not exhibit these traits.
TL;DR: It is argued that major changes in the eighteenth-century material culture and retail sector were not significantly linked to preconditions of economic growth and urbanization, usually connected to expanding urban economies and societies.
Abstract: This article examines the interplay between retail changes and transformations in the material culture of Antwerp, a provincial town in the southern Netherlands. We argue that major changes in the eighteenth-century material culture and retail sector were not significantly linked to preconditions of economic growth and urbanization. The Antwerp ‘retail paradox’ is that of a shrinking economic horizon running parallel to material culture and retail transformations, usually connected to expanding urban economies and societies. Changing retail and consumer practices explain the growing and prospering retail sector, rather than a growing economy.
TL;DR: In this paper, a case study of one urban locality (Lancaster) between 1880 and 1914 uses qualitative and quantitative techniques, particularly longitudinal record linkage, to explore relationships between live-in domestic servants and their employers.
Abstract: It has been argued that domestic service heightened divisions of class and gender, and supported the private nuclear family in late nineteenth-century England. This case study of one urban locality (Lancaster) between 1880 and 1914 uses qualitative and quantitative techniques, particularly longitudinal record linkage, to explore relationships between live-in domestic servants and their employers. It is argued that there were considerable similarities between the backgrounds and life-cycle-related motivations of both servants and employers. Relationships were highly diverse, but service simultaneously depended upon and played a crucial role in sustaining complex, localized networks that extended far beyond the servant-employing household.
TL;DR: The development of the high-pressure expansive engine represented a watershed in the evolution of steam power technology, allowing the attainment of major fuel economies as discussed by the authors, but despite its superior fuel efficiency, the high pressure expansive engine did not find widespread application in other steam-using regions (in particular in Lancashire), where the Watt low-pressure engine continued to be the favourite option.
Abstract: The development of the high-pressure expansive engine represented a watershed in the evolution of steam power technology, allowing the attainment of major fuel economies. In Britain, Cornish engineers took the lead in the exploration of this specific technological trajectory. Notwithstanding its superior fuel efficiency was immediately widely discussed, the high-pressure expansive engine did not find widespread application in other steam-using regions (in particular in Lancashire), where the Watt low-pressure engine continued to be the favourite option. This article provides a reassessment of the factors accounting for the precocious adoption of the high-pressure steam engine in Cornwall and for its delayed fortune in the rest of Britain. T raditional accounts of the British industrial revolution have, more or less explicitly, assumed that a wide range of industrial sectors rapidly benefited from the development of steam power technology. Rostow’s work can be considered representative of this view. Rostow dated the British ‘take-off’ to the years 1783‐1802, linking it explicitly with the commercialization of the Boulton and Watt engine. 2 More recent research has suggested that such a direct link between steam power and early industrialization is actually spurious.The available shreds of evidence suggest that during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the British economy was still dominated by the extensive use of animal, wind, and water power. 3 Furthermore, the economy-wide repercussions of the progressive adoption of steam technology remained circumscribed until at least the 1840s. Therefore, it seems that traditional accounts have improperly conflated the early development of the steam engine (and in particular the invention of the Watt engine) with its economic significance. In contrast, von Tunzelmann and Crafts point out that the widespread adoption of the steam engine had to await a number of improvements that progressively reduced its power costs relative to other energy sources. 4
TL;DR: In this article, the 1840s Admiralty seamen's tickets were used to explore three anthropometric issues: being born in a city, with its associated disamenities, lead to stunting.
Abstract: A new source, 1840s Admiralty seamen's tickets, is used to explore three anthropometric issues. First, did being born in a city, with its associated disamenities, lead to stunting? Second, did being born near a city, whose markets sucked away foodstuffs, lead to stunting? Third, did child labour lead to stunting? We find that only those born in very large cities suffered a level of stunting that contemporaries could have observed. Being born near a city, which gave parents opportunities to trade away family calories, and perhaps increased exposure to disease, did not cause stunting. Britain was a well-integrated market; all families, whatever their locations, had options to trade and faced similar disease environments. Finally, although adults who had gone to sea young were shorter than those who did not enlist until fully grown, going to sea did not stunt. Instead, plentiful food at sea attracted stunted adolescents, who reversed most of their stunting as a result. But child labour at sea was different from other forms of children's work because wages were largely hypothecated to the child as food and shelter onboard. In contrast, where wages were paid to the child or his parents in cash, they became submerged in the household economy and their benefits were shared with other family members.
TL;DR: In this paper, the impact of the voyages of discovery on European spice markets is explored, and a simple model of monopoly and oligopoly is proposed to decompose the sources of the Cape route's impact on European markets.
Abstract: This article explores the impact of the ‘Voyages of Discovery’ on European spice markets, asking whether the exploits of Vasco da Gama and others brought European and Asian spice markets closer together. To this end we compare trends in pepper and fine spice prices before and after 1503, the year when da Gama returned from his financially successful second voyage. Other authors have examined trends in nominal spice prices, but this article uses relative spice prices, that is, accounting for inflation. We find that the Voyages of Discovery had a major impact on European spice markets, and provide a simple model of monopoly and oligopoly to decompose the sources of the Cape route's impact on European markets. Finally, we offer some speculations regarding the impact of the Cape route on intra-European market integration.
TL;DR: In this paper, a case study of a common in Flanders looks at the evidence for this in the eighteenth century, examining bookkeeping and other archival sources, and a model that incorporates the different functions of the commons (sustainability, efficiency, and utility) is explained and applied.
Abstract: Despite the wide application of the metaphor of ‘the tragedy of the commons’, there is little historical literature that points to the weaknesses of its historical basis. There is, however, sufficient qualitative and quantitative evidence to prove that commons were well regulated and organized in order to achieve a sustainable management, that also took into account the needs and wishes of its commoners. This case study of a common in Flanders looks at the evidence for this in the eighteenth century, examining bookkeeping and other archival sources. A model that incorporates the different functions of the commons (sustainability, efficiency, and utility) is explained and applied.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used club theory to explain why two major medieval commercial centres in northern Europe, Liubeck and Danzig, declined in the early modern period. But they did not consider the role of the political institutions in these two cities.
Abstract: This article uses club theory to explain why two major medieval commercial centres declined in the early modern period. Luibeck and Danzig illuminate the difficulties experienced by old-style European towns where early modern guilds (and other privileged 'corporations') had a lot of political influence in making the transition to the new style of north-west European cities such as Amsterdam and Hamburg. The article refutes theories proposing that the special privileges awarded to a merchant elite enhanced economic growth; instead, it is argued that those privileges gave rise to 'club goods' that were beneficial only to a small number of merchants and were provided at the expense of society at large, resulting in economic decline. iibeck and Danzig (present-day Gdansk), two major late medieval trading centres in northern Europe, became increasingly marginalized in the Euro pean trading network that evolved in the early modern period. Why did Luibeck, the former leader of the mighty Hansa, sink into insignificance in the early modern period? And why did Danzig, the dominating grain entrepot of the Baltic, decline in importance as a trading centre such that its population decreased by half between the zenith of the grain trade around 1650 and the Prussian conquest in 1793? The stagnation in the urban populations of Liubeck and Danzig is quite remarkable, comparatively speaking. According to data presented by Bairoch, between 1500 and 1700, the populations of more than half of the 52 major European ports doubled in size, whereas stagnation or decline occurred in only 17 per cent. The latter were mostly located in Mediterranean cities, where unfavour able general economic developments took their toll on urbanization.' The great expansion in economic activity after 1500 instead benefited cities adjacent to the Atlantic in north-western Europe.2 The increasingly marginal positions of Luibeck and Danzig in the European urban network can, on the one hand, readily be ex plained by external factors, particularly geographical ones, in that these cities were marginalized when the new urban network became centred along the Amsterdam London axis. There is, on the other hand, an element of circular reasoning in this explanation. The decline of Liubeck and Danzig, while inherent to the development of a new urban hierarchy of commercial cities in which the two cities played an increasingly marginal role, was not simply caused by external forces acting to retard Hanseatic commercial growth. Rather, an endogenous explanation can be proposed, one that takes into account how the political institutions in Liubeck and Danzig governed trade and how, as a result of their governance, the
TL;DR: The definitive version can be found at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/ Economic History Society 2008 [Full text of this article is not available in the UHRA].
Abstract: The definitive version can be found at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/ Economic History Society 2008 [Full text of this article is not available in the UHRA]
TL;DR: This paper examined the quality of bank shareholder con stituencies over the nineteenth century and found that shareholders' con-stituencies did not deteriorate in quality until the introduction of limited liability and attributed the non-deterioration of shareholders' constituency to bank deeds which locked in the aggregate quality of shareholder constituency by empowering directors to vet all share transfers.
Abstract: The joint-stock banks that established after the liberalizing legislation of 1826 were periodically criticized during the nineteenth century for their low-quality and rapidly deteriorating shareholder constituencies. The quality of a bank's shareholding con stituency was of paramount importance because of unlimited shareholder liability. Using archival records, this article examines the quality of bank shareholder con stituencies over the nineteenth century. The main finding is that shareholder con stituencies did not deteriorate in quality until the introduction of limited liability. The non-deterioration of constituencies is attributed to bank deeds which locked in the aggregate quality of shareholder constituencies by empowering directors to vet all share transfers.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors re-examine the response to what were actually two sterling crises and conclude that the decision not to devalue but seek external support was justifiable, given changes within the international economy which were to create problems for many postwar nation states.
Abstract: Conventional wisdom is critical of the newly elected Labour government's reaction to external financial difficulties in the autumn of 1964. Anxious about its political position, it avoided the necessary measures, involving stringent deflation and possibly devaluation. This article seeks to revise the traditional view by re-examining the response to what were actually two sterling crises. The first was handled efficiently. The second was provoked by speculation stemming from market expectations of devaluation. The decision not to devalue but seek external support was justifiable, given changes within the international economy which were to create problems for many postwar nation states.
TL;DR: New Zealand's economic development during the years of global economic expansion to 1914 and during the global economic retreat of the 1920s and 1930s is considered in this article, where Williamson, Acemoglu, and Sachs draw upon the earlier staple export-led eco nomic growth historyiography to consider how refrigerated exports shaped New Zealand economic development.
Abstract: Higher farm and manufacturing productivity associated with refrigerated exports led to New Zealand's attainment of the world's highest Human Development Index in 1913. Local responses to export opportunities increased the social depth of land ownership and fostered intensive growth. Closer settlement meant that land-related income gains spread widely, but land market volatility also created instability. New Zealand had the world's highest GDP per capita in 1938, but it experienced long swings in its growth rates. Dramatic swings in rural land market activity engendered by the pastoral boom contributed greatly to a long depression in the 1920s; subse quently a new monetary regime facilitated fast recovery. L ong-standing debates surrounding the development of peripheral, natural esource-abundant economies during the era of wider industrialization and world trade growth after 1870 have been re-invigorated by a variety of recent perspectives, including those linking global trade expansion to income inequality around the periphery; those associating colonial institutions with reversal of eco nomic fortunes; and those viewing natural resource abundance as a curse rather than a boon; ideas associated respectively with Williamson, Acemoglu, and Sachs.2 This article draws upon these ideas, and upon the earlier staple export-led eco nomic growth historiography, to consider how refrigerated exports shaped New Zealand's economic development, both during the years of global economic expansion to 1914 and during the global economic retreat of the 1920s and 1930s. New Zealand offers a case study that reveals the potential benefits and the possible downsides of specializing upon export staples and helps to inform the wider debates by highlighting the centrality of local responses to global opportu nities.3 Incomes per capita in New Zealand were among the highest in the world in both 1913 and 1938, but its income fluctuations and long depression of the 1920s and early 1930s led to doubts in New Zealand surrounding the long-term
TL;DR: Despite rapid increases in manual workers' wages, poverty rates among the elderly remained high in late Victorian England, although they varied significantly across Poor Law Unions as mentioned in this paper, and regression equations were estimated in order to explain variations across unions in pauperism rates.
Abstract: Despite rapid increases in manual workers' wages, poverty rates among the elderly remained high in late Victorian England, although they varied significantly across Poor Law Unions. This paper begins by examining the ability of workers to provide for their old age. A data set is constructed, consisting of all English Poor Law Unions in 1891–2, and regression equations are estimated in order to explain variations across unions in pauperism rates. This is followed by the testing of several conjectures made by contemporaries, and repeated by historians, regarding the deterrent effect of workhouse relief, the effects of wages and of the industrial character of Poor Law Unions on pauperism rates, and regional differences in workers' reliance on the poor law. The paper then examines the implications of these results for the debate over national old age pensions in the decades before the adoption of the Old Age Pension Act.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present new county estimates, taking advantage of the fact that it is now possible to avoid some of the logical difficulties that Rickman encountered because independent estimates of national population totals are now available.
Abstract: In the 1830s, Rickman, who had supervised the taking of the first four censuses, secured additional returns of baptisms, burials, and marriages from all Anglican incumbents whose registers began early. He made use of the returns to produce new estimates of the population of each county from the sixteenth century onwards. His estimates were published in the 1841 census after his death and have been very widely quoted ever since. This article presents new county estimates, taking advantage of the fact that it is now possible to avoid some of the logical difficulties that Rickman encountered because independent estimates of national population totals are now available. A ll subsequent discussion of the differential population growth rates of English counties between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries rests upon the empirical foundation laid by the work of Rickman in supervising the taking of the
TL;DR: This paper argued that the 1667 Peace Treaty of Breda was a major turning point in Anglo-Dutch relations after which mercantilism ceased to dominate Anglo- Dutch political relations.
Abstract: The three Anglo-Dutch wars of the seventeenth century are traditionally seen as mercantile confrontations. This view has been challenged by political historians. Firstly, this article discusses the historiographic developments in this field. Secondly, it aims to explore the relationship between Anglo-Dutch mercantile competition and political and diplomatic relations in the period 1650 to 1674. It favours an integrated approach in which all these dimensions are taken into account. The article argues that the 1667 Peace Treaty of Breda was a major turning point in Anglo-Dutch relations after which mercantilism ceased to dominate Anglo-Dutch political relations.
TL;DR: The authors argue that no sharp distinction between qualitative and quantitative concepts can be drawn, as almost any concept used to describe a past society is implicitly quantitative, and they show that this triangulation method can be extended to many apparently qualitative sources.
Abstract: Many historians reject quantitative methods as inappropriate to understanding past societies.This article argues that no sharp distinction between qualitative and quantitative concepts can be drawn, as almost any concept used to describe a past society is implicitly quantitative. Many recent advances in understanding have been achieved by deriving quantitative evidence from qualitative evidence, using the two dialectically, and indexing them against other quantitative findings from the same population. We show that this triangulation method can be extended to many apparently qualitative sources. Despite its successes, the potential of turning qualitative into quantitative evidence has only just begun to be exploited.