Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction

Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction
Author: Robert C. Allen
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2011-09-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 019162053X

Why are some countries rich and others poor? In 1500, the income differences were small, but they have grown dramatically since Columbus reached America. Since then, the interplay between geography, globalization, technological change, and economic policy has determined the wealth and poverty of nations. The industrial revolution was Britain's path breaking response to the challenge of globalization. Western Europe and North America joined Britain to form a club of rich nations by pursuing four polices-creating a national market by abolishing internal tariffs and investing in transportation, erecting an external tariff to protect their fledgling industries from British competition, banks to stabilize the currency and mobilize domestic savings for investment, and mass education to prepare people for industrial work. Together these countries pioneered new technologies that have made them ever richer. Before the Industrial Revolution, most of the world's manufacturing was done in Asia, but industries from Casablanca to Canton were destroyed by western competition in the nineteenth century, and Asia was transformed into 'underdeveloped countries' specializing in agriculture. The spread of economic development has been slow since modern technology was invented to fit the needs of rich countries and is ill adapted to the economic and geographical conditions of poor countries. A few countries - Japan, Soviet Russia, South Korea, Taiwan, and perhaps China - have, nonetheless, caught up with the West through creative responses to the technological challenge and with Big Push industrialization that has achieved rapid growth through investment coordination. Whether other countries can emulate the success of East Asia is a challenge for the future. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

A History of the Global Economy

A History of the Global Economy
Author: Joerg Baten
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2016-03-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 110710470X

"In co-operation with the International Economic History Association."

Contours of the World Economy 1-2030 AD

Contours of the World Economy 1-2030 AD
Author: Angus Maddison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2007-09-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0199227217

This book seeks to identify the forces which explain how and why some parts of the world have grown rich and others have lagged behind. Encompassing 2000 years of history, part 1 begins with the Roman Empire and explores the key factors that have influenced economic development in Africa,Asia, the Americas and Europe. Part 2 covers the development of macroeconomic tools of analysis from the 17th century to the present. Part 3 looks to the future and considers what the shape of the world economy might be in 2030. Combining both the close quantitative analysis for which ProfessorMaddison is famous with a more qualitative approach that takes into account the complexity of the forces at work, this book provides students and all interested readers with a totally fascinating overview of world economic history. Professor Maddison has the unique ability to synthesise vast amountsof information into a clear narrative flow that entertains as well as informs, making this text an invaluable resource for all students and scholars, and anyone interested in trying to understand why some parts of the World are so much richer than others.

A Farewell to Alms

A Farewell to Alms
Author: Gregory Clark
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2008-12-29
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1400827817

Why are some parts of the world so rich and others so poor? Why did the Industrial Revolution--and the unprecedented economic growth that came with it--occur in eighteenth-century England, and not at some other time, or in some other place? Why didn't industrialization make the whole world rich--and why did it make large parts of the world even poorer? In A Farewell to Alms, Gregory Clark tackles these profound questions and suggests a new and provocative way in which culture--not exploitation, geography, or resources--explains the wealth, and the poverty, of nations. Countering the prevailing theory that the Industrial Revolution was sparked by the sudden development of stable political, legal, and economic institutions in seventeenth-century Europe, Clark shows that such institutions existed long before industrialization. He argues instead that these institutions gradually led to deep cultural changes by encouraging people to abandon hunter-gatherer instincts-violence, impatience, and economy of effort-and adopt economic habits-hard work, rationality, and education. The problem, Clark says, is that only societies that have long histories of settlement and security seem to develop the cultural characteristics and effective workforces that enable economic growth. For the many societies that have not enjoyed long periods of stability, industrialization has not been a blessing. Clark also dissects the notion, championed by Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs, and Steel, that natural endowments such as geography account for differences in the wealth of nations. A brilliant and sobering challenge to the idea that poor societies can be economically developed through outside intervention, A Farewell to Alms may change the way global economic history is understood.

Routledge Handbook of Global Economic History

Routledge Handbook of Global Economic History
Author: Francesco Boldizzoni
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 778
Release: 2015-12-22
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1317561856

The Routledge Handbook of Global Economic History documents and interprets the development of economic history as a global discipline from the later nineteenth century to the present day. Exploring the normative and relativistic nature of different schools and traditions of thought, this handbook not only examines current paradigmatic western approaches, but also those conceived in less open societies and in varied economic, political and cultural contexts. In doing so, this book clears the way for greater critical understanding and a more genuinely global approach to economic history. This handbook brings together leading international contributors in order to systematically address cultural and intellectual traditions around the globe. Many of these are exposed for consideration for the first time in English. The chapters explore dominant ideas and historiographical trends, and open them up to critical transnational perspectives. This volume is essential reading for both academics and students in economic and social history. As this field of study is very much a bridge between the social sciences and humanities, the issues examined in the book will also have relevance for those seeking to understand the evolution of other academic disciplines under the pressures of varied economic, political and cultural circumstances, on both national and global scales.

Routledge Handbook of Modern Economic History

Routledge Handbook of Modern Economic History
Author: Robert Whaples
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 365
Release: 2013
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0415677041

The aim of The Handbook of Modern Economic History will be to introduce readers to the key approaches and findings of economic historians who study the modern world. Modern economic history blends two approaches ' Cliometrics (which focuses on measuring economic variables and explicitly testing theories about the historical performance and development of the economy, as exemplified by the approach of Robert Fogel) and the New Institutional Economics (which focuses on how social, cultural, legal and organizational norms and rules shape ...

A Concise Economic History of the World

A Concise Economic History of the World
Author: Rondo E. Cameron
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 484
Release: 1993
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780195074451

This classic book offers a broad sweep of economic history from prehistoric times to the present, and explores the disparity of wealth among nations. Now in its fourth edition, A Concise Economic History of the World includes expanded coverage of recent developments in the European Union, transition economies, and East Asia.

The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco-Roman World

The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco-Roman World
Author: Walter Scheidel
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 17
Release: 2007-11-29
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0521780535

In this, the first comprehensive survey of the economies of classical antiquity, twenty-eight chapters summarise the current state of scholarship in their specialised fields and sketch new directions for research. They reflect a new interest in economic growth in antiquity and develop new methods for measuring economic development, often combining textual and archaeological data that have previously been treated separately.

Routledge Handbook of the History of Global Economic Thought

Routledge Handbook of the History of Global Economic Thought
Author: Vincent Barnett
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2014-08-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1317644123

The Routledge Handbook of the History of Global Economic Thought offers the first comprehensive overview of the long-run history of economic thought from a truly international perspective. Although globalization has facilitated the spread of ideas between nations, the history of economics has tended to be studied either thematically (by topic), in terms of different currents of thought, or individually (by economist). Work has been published in the past on the economic thought traditions of specific countries, but this pioneering volume is unique in offering a wide-ranging comparative account of the development of economic ideas and philosophies on the international stage. The volume brings together leading experts on the development of economic ideas from across the world in order to offer a truly international comparison of the economics within nation-states. Each author presents a long-term perspective on economics in their region, allowing global patterns in the progress of economic ideas over time to be identified. The specially commissioned chapters cover the vast sweep of the history of economics across five world regions, including Europe (England, Scotland, Ireland, Italy Greece, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Sweden, Russia and the Ukraine), the Americas (the USA, Canada, Mexico and Central America, Spanish-Speaking South America, Brazil and the Caribbean), the Middle East (Turkey, Israel, Arab-Islamic Economics, Persia/Iran, North Africa), Africa (West Africa, Southern Africa, Mozambique and Angola), and the Asia-Pacific Region (Australia and New Zealand, China, Southeast Asia, the Asian Tigers, India.) This rigorous, ambitious and highly scholarly volume will be of key interest to students, academics, policy professionals and to interested general readers across the globe.