Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-26DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101695
Marcos Castillo, Martin Dribe, Jonas Helgertz
Between 1850 and 1930, millions of Europeans emigrated to the United States, attracted by opportunities for a better life. We study the role of migrant networks in fostering emigration, using individual-level Swedish full-count census data for men and women, linked to emigration records. Our findings show that having previously migrating siblings was an important determinant of emigration, particularly if the migrating sibling was of the same gender. The presence of migrant networks of kin outside the immediate family also promoted emigration. Moreover, migrant networks were most important for prospective migrants from areas with the weakest migration history. The importance of migrant networks for women did not vary according to social class, while for men in rural areas, the role of siblings emigrating was more important influencing emigration in the lowest social class.
{"title":"Kinship and opportunity: Swedish chain migration to the United States, 1880–1920","authors":"Marcos Castillo, Martin Dribe, Jonas Helgertz","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101695","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101695","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Between 1850 and 1930, millions of Europeans emigrated to the United States, attracted by opportunities for a better life. We study the role of migrant networks in fostering emigration, using individual-level Swedish full-count census data for men and women, linked to emigration records. Our findings show that having previously migrating siblings was an important determinant of emigration, particularly if the migrating sibling was of the same gender. The presence of migrant networks of kin outside the immediate family also promoted emigration. Moreover, migrant networks were most important for prospective migrants from areas with the weakest migration history. The importance of migrant networks for women did not vary according to social class, while for men in rural areas, the role of siblings emigrating was more important influencing emigration in the lowest social class.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101695"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144196454","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-29DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101698
Mark Carlson
This paper explores simultaneous developments in the banking sector and the real economy during the Great Depression and whether these are related to shifts in beliefs about economic prospects. It identifies a notable coincidence of bank closures and declines in consumer durable consumption (new automobile purchases) in Ohio in the early 1930s. To examine whether shifts in beliefs and the economic concerns of households and businesses may have mattered, I test whether keywords from local newspapers related to economic prospects or sentiments are associated with subsequent bank closures and declines in automobile purchases. The results support the idea that beliefs mattered for both of those outcomes, even after accounting for economic fundamentals. The analysis also highlights the importance of local economic conditions in shaping behavior.
{"title":"Durable consumption, bank distress, economic concerns, and how they interacted during the great depression","authors":"Mark Carlson","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101698","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101698","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper explores simultaneous developments in the banking sector and the real economy during the Great Depression and whether these are related to shifts in beliefs about economic prospects. It identifies a notable coincidence of bank closures and declines in consumer durable consumption (new automobile purchases) in Ohio in the early 1930s. To examine whether shifts in beliefs and the economic concerns of households and businesses may have mattered, I test whether keywords from local newspapers related to economic prospects or sentiments are associated with subsequent bank closures and declines in automobile purchases. The results support the idea that beliefs mattered for both of those outcomes, even after accounting for economic fundamentals. The analysis also highlights the importance of local economic conditions in shaping behavior.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101698"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144229877","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-03-08DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101678
Cameron Campbell , James Z. Lee
We decompose population growth in 19th century Liaoning in northeast China into the shares accounted for by different socioeconomic groups, and by time periods with different economic conditions as reflected in grain prices. This decomposition reveals who benefitted the most when social and economic conditions supported population increase. Previous studies of one region for which relevant data are available, northeast China, showed that birth and death rates varied according to community, household, and individual context, but did not investigate differences in growth rates by context, or the shares of population growth accounted for by each group. Using the same dataset, we decompose population growth by synthesizing differentials in mortality and fertility into estimates of implied growth rates of population subgroups and the shares of total population growth they account for. This decomposition framework can be applied in any setting where household registers or other sources allow for the measurement of the mortality and fertility rates of population subgroups at fixed points of time. We show that advantaged socioeconomic groups contributed disproportionately to population growth in northeast China, and that more growth took place when harvests were good, that is when grain prices were low. Even though mortality and fertility responses to grain price fluctuations varied across subgroups, there is no evidence of differential response of growth rates to these fluctuations. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for our understanding of population dynamics in the late Qing.
{"title":"Socioeconomic differences in population growth in 19th century Liaoning, China: a decomposition","authors":"Cameron Campbell , James Z. Lee","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101678","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101678","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>We decompose population growth in 19th century Liaoning in northeast China into the shares accounted for by different socioeconomic groups, and by time periods with different economic conditions as reflected in grain prices. This decomposition reveals who benefitted the most when social and economic conditions supported population increase. Previous studies of one region for which relevant data are available, northeast China, showed that birth and death rates varied according to community, household, and individual context, but did not investigate differences in growth rates by context, or the shares of population growth accounted for by each group. Using the same dataset, we decompose population growth by synthesizing differentials in mortality and fertility into estimates of implied growth rates of population subgroups and the shares of total population growth they account for. This decomposition framework can be applied in any setting where household registers or other sources allow for the measurement of the mortality and fertility rates of population subgroups at fixed points of time. We show that advantaged socioeconomic groups contributed disproportionately to population growth in northeast China, and that more growth took place when harvests were good, that is when grain prices were low. Even though mortality and fertility responses to grain price fluctuations varied across subgroups, there is no evidence of differential response of growth rates to these fluctuations. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for our understanding of population dynamics in the late Qing.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101678"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143609459","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-21DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101685
Taylor Jaworski , Dongkyu Yang
The participation of the United States in World War II led to a substantial mobilization of domestic resources to produce the materiel used on the battlefields of Europe and in the Pacific. We produce new estimates for the impact of war mobilization on long-run economic growth and regional development in the United States over the postwar period. Guided by an economic geography model, we interpret our estimates as the direct effect of mobilization on local productivity. The findings suggest the largest likely aggregate welfare impact was modest, although there is variation across region. In addition, industrial mobilization contributed to manufacturing growth relatively more in the Northeast and Midwest, and less in the South and West.
{"title":"Did war mobilization cause aggregate and regional growth?","authors":"Taylor Jaworski , Dongkyu Yang","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101685","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101685","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The participation of the United States in World War II led to a substantial mobilization of domestic resources to produce the materiel used on the battlefields of Europe and in the Pacific. We produce new estimates for the impact of war mobilization on long-run economic growth and regional development in the United States over the postwar period. Guided by an economic geography model, we interpret our estimates as the direct effect of mobilization on local productivity. The findings suggest the largest likely aggregate welfare impact was modest, although there is variation across region. In addition, industrial mobilization contributed to manufacturing growth relatively more in the Northeast and Midwest, and less in the South and West.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101685"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144138616","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-04-01DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101680
Paolo Di Martino , Fabio C. Bagliano
This paper analyzes monetary policy in Italy between 1894 and WWI by focusing on the main bank of issue at the time (the Banca d’Italia, BdI) and the Treasury. We show that the Treasury set multiple official rates, and the BdI determined an ”effective” rate transmitted to the market by discounting different bills to the various rates; we provide an original measure of this rate based on primary sources. The BdI changed its rate in response to the domestic market rate (although with a milder reaction than the Treasury), the stock of money in circulation, and its reserve coverage ratio. Changes in the official discount rates in France and Germany also triggered relatively modest reactions. Neither the exchange rate nor the state of the domestic economy affected the setting of the rate. Until the turn of the century, the BdI only targeted corporate goals of profitability and financial soundness, while it also pursued policy aims afterward. In this context, the bank set the discount rate to accumulate reserves for market interventions.
{"title":"Monetary policy at the periphery during the Classical Gold Standard: Italy (1894–1913)","authors":"Paolo Di Martino , Fabio C. Bagliano","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101680","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101680","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper analyzes monetary policy in Italy between 1894 and WWI by focusing on the main bank of issue at the time (the <em>Banca d’Italia</em>, BdI) and the Treasury. We show that the Treasury set multiple official rates, and the BdI determined an ”effective” rate transmitted to the market by discounting different bills to the various rates; we provide an original measure of this rate based on primary sources. The BdI changed its rate in response to the domestic market rate (although with a milder reaction than the Treasury), the stock of money in circulation, and its reserve coverage ratio. Changes in the official discount rates in France and Germany also triggered relatively modest reactions. Neither the exchange rate nor the state of the domestic economy affected the setting of the rate. Until the turn of the century, the BdI only targeted corporate goals of profitability and financial soundness, while it also pursued policy aims afterward. In this context, the bank set the discount rate to accumulate reserves for market interventions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101680"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143799967","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-15DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101690
Jonatan Andersson
This article examines the assimilation of rural-born people into the urban economy in the industrialization context, focusing on Sweden from 1880 to 1910—a time characterized by a notable shift in economic activity towards urban areas. I utilize individual-level data on three cohorts of rural-urban migrants linked across census records, allowing for an examination of their labor market assimilation across all Swedish towns. The main findings suggest that the labor market assimilation of male migrants followed a Chiswick-like process, regardless of the size of the destination area. Initially, migrants displayed a sizeable negative gap in labor market outcomes compared to urban natives, which narrowed with the time spent in the urban area. Nevertheless, they never managed to close the gap over time. By contrast, female migrants displayed few signs of converging with female natives. Migrants’ inability to close the gap was likely due to the non-transferability of skills between the rural and urban sectors. The convergence that did occur can be explained by the potential for upward mobility from the relatively low initial positions migrants entered and, to some extent, negative selection into return migration.
{"title":"Ascending from the bottom rung: The labor market assimilation of rural-urban migrants in Sweden, 1880–1910","authors":"Jonatan Andersson","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101690","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101690","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This article examines the assimilation of rural-born people into the urban economy in the industrialization context, focusing on Sweden from 1880 to 1910—a time characterized by a notable shift in economic activity towards urban areas. I utilize individual-level data on three cohorts of rural-urban migrants linked across census records, allowing for an examination of their labor market assimilation across all Swedish towns. The main findings suggest that the labor market assimilation of male migrants followed a Chiswick-like process, regardless of the size of the destination area. Initially, migrants displayed a sizeable negative gap in labor market outcomes compared to urban natives, which narrowed with the time spent in the urban area. Nevertheless, they never managed to close the gap over time. By contrast, female migrants displayed few signs of converging with female natives. Migrants’ inability to close the gap was likely due to the non-transferability of skills between the rural and urban sectors. The convergence that did occur can be explained by the potential for upward mobility from the relatively low initial positions migrants entered and, to some extent, negative selection into return migration.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101690"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143947118","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-21DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101689
Rafael R. Guthmann , Walter Scheidel
This paper investigates the economic aspects of slavery in the ancient Greco-Roman world. Existing evidence reveals significant variation in the relative cost of slaves compared to unskilled wages: it appears that at different times and places, a typical slave could be purchased for prices equivalent to wages paid from 150 to 1000 days of unskilled labor. To explain this great disparity, we develop a principal–agent model that predicts the return on slaves relative to wages, which varies as a function of the prevalence of slavery in the labor force. This model implies that slavery may have increased aggregate labor productivity by reallocating workers from less productive to more productive regions within the Greco-Roman world.
{"title":"The economics of Greco-Roman slavery","authors":"Rafael R. Guthmann , Walter Scheidel","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101689","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101689","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper investigates the economic aspects of slavery in the ancient Greco-Roman world. Existing evidence reveals significant variation in the relative cost of slaves compared to unskilled wages: it appears that at different times and places, a typical slave could be purchased for prices equivalent to wages paid from 150 to 1000 days of unskilled labor. To explain this great disparity, we develop a principal–agent model that predicts the return on slaves relative to wages, which varies as a function of the prevalence of slavery in the labor force. This model implies that slavery may have increased aggregate labor productivity by reallocating workers from less productive to more productive regions within the Greco-Roman world.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101689"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144169791","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-02-15DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101667
Satomi KUROSU , Hao DONG
This study investigates the effects of economic stress on out-migration behaviors using individual-level panel data transcribed from local population registers of three villages and a neighboring town in northeastern Japan in 1708–1870. Economic stress under study includes local economic hardship, measured by rice price fluctuations, and large-scale famines. We apply multinomial logistic models to examine competing risks of migration for various reasons and to compare rural and non-rural populations. The likelihood of service-related migration declined while that of illegal absconding increased during times of economic hardship. Rural residents were more vulnerable to famines, whereas urban residents were more affected by rice price fluctuations. Moreover, systematic socioeconomic heterogeneities existed in the migration responses to economic stress between the landowner/tax-payer and landless/non-tax-payer classes. Overall, this study dissects the complex dynamics of migration responses to economic stress, revealing significant variations based on migration reasons, socioeconomic status, and rural-urban contexts.
{"title":"Economic stress and migration in early modern Japan: Rural-urban comparative evidence from population registers","authors":"Satomi KUROSU , Hao DONG","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101667","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101667","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study investigates the effects of economic stress on out-migration behaviors using individual-level panel data transcribed from local population registers of three villages and a neighboring town in northeastern Japan in 1708–1870. Economic stress under study includes local economic hardship, measured by rice price fluctuations, and large-scale famines. We apply multinomial logistic models to examine competing risks of migration for various reasons and to compare rural and non-rural populations. The likelihood of service-related migration declined while that of illegal absconding increased during times of economic hardship. Rural residents were more vulnerable to famines, whereas urban residents were more affected by rice price fluctuations. Moreover, systematic socioeconomic heterogeneities existed in the migration responses to economic stress between the landowner/tax-payer and landless/non-tax-payer classes. Overall, this study dissects the complex dynamics of migration responses to economic stress, revealing significant variations based on migration reasons, socioeconomic status, and rural-urban contexts.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101667"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143471462","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-03-07DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101671
Péter Őri, Levente Pakot
Demographic response to short-term price fluctuations can be interpreted as an indicator of living standards in pre-modern societies. In this paper, we demonstrate how childbearing and infant and child mortality responded to changes in rye prices in two nineteenth-century Hungarian sub-regions. We conducted a micro-level demographic analysis based on family reconstitution data and multivariate statistical methods (event history analysis). Our findings reveal that both childbearing and child mortality differed between the two regions, and that both were affected by short-term economic fluctuations, but that the responses depended strongly on local economic, demographic and socio-cultural conditions. Child mortality responded markedly to rising rye prices, but in our Central Hungarian study population with high fertility and high infant and child mortality, this response was stronger than in our West Hungarian study population with more modest child mortality and fertility. At the same time, the mortality response to changing prices increased over time in both populations as a result of local industrialization in the latter and modernization of the surrounding region in the former. An immediate and presumably deliberate fertility response of the landless to rising food prices was more characteristic of the Western study population before 1870 while it was not observed in the Central population. Our results, therefore, emphasize the similarities with evidence from other European or Asian communities, and – at the same time – the importance of local context in explaining our findings.
{"title":"Fertility and mortality responses to short-term economic stress: Evidence from two Hungarian sample populations, 1819-1914","authors":"Péter Őri, Levente Pakot","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101671","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101671","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Demographic response to short-term price fluctuations can be interpreted as an indicator of living standards in pre-modern societies. In this paper, we demonstrate how childbearing and infant and child mortality responded to changes in rye prices in two nineteenth-century Hungarian sub-regions. We conducted a micro-level demographic analysis based on family reconstitution data and multivariate statistical methods (event history analysis). Our findings reveal that both childbearing and child mortality differed between the two regions, and that both were affected by short-term economic fluctuations, but that the responses depended strongly on local economic, demographic and socio-cultural conditions. Child mortality responded markedly to rising rye prices, but in our Central Hungarian study population with high fertility and high infant and child mortality, this response was stronger than in our West Hungarian study population with more modest child mortality and fertility. At the same time, the mortality response to changing prices increased over time in both populations as a result of local industrialization in the latter and modernization of the surrounding region in the former. An immediate and presumably deliberate fertility response of the landless to rising food prices was more characteristic of the Western study population before 1870 while it was not observed in the Central population. Our results, therefore, emphasize the similarities with evidence from other European or Asian communities, and – at the same time – the importance of local context in explaining our findings.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101671"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143619525","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-07-01Epub Date: 2025-05-24DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101696
Peter Grajzl , Peter Murrell
Most modernization or development theories that incorporate law emphasize a growth in the scope of individual choice as law becomes impartial, relevant to all. An early expression of this conceptualization was Henry Maine's (1822–1888) celebrated dictum that progressive societies move from status to contract. We conduct an inquiry into Maine's conjecture using machine-learning applied to two early-modern English corpora, on caselaw and print culture. We train word embeddings on each corpus and produce time series of emphases on contract, status, and contract versus status. Only caselaw exhibits an increasing emphasis on contract versus status, and even that trend is discernible only before the Civil War. Thus, our findings indicate that development theories emphasizing the widening of individual choice do not characterize England in the century prior to the Industrial Revolution. After 1660, caselaw trends reflect the increasing importance of equity compared to common-law, with equity increasingly emphasizing status. This effect is particularly evident in family and inheritance law. In print culture, religion consistently emphasizes contract over status while politics exhibits a downward-trending emphasis on contract versus status. VAR estimates reveal that ideas in caselaw and print culture coevolved.
{"title":"From status to contract? A macrohistory from early-modern English caselaw and print culture","authors":"Peter Grajzl , Peter Murrell","doi":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101696","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101696","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Most modernization or development theories that incorporate law emphasize a growth in the scope of individual choice as law becomes impartial, relevant to all. An early expression of this conceptualization was Henry Maine's (1822–1888) celebrated dictum that progressive societies move from status to contract. We conduct an inquiry into Maine's conjecture using machine-learning applied to two early-modern English corpora, on caselaw and print culture. We train word embeddings on each corpus and produce time series of emphases on contract, status, and contract versus status. Only caselaw exhibits an increasing emphasis on contract versus status, and even that trend is discernible only before the Civil War. Thus, our findings indicate that development theories emphasizing the widening of individual choice do not characterize England in the century prior to the Industrial Revolution. After 1660, caselaw trends reflect the increasing importance of equity compared to common-law, with equity increasingly emphasizing status. This effect is particularly evident in family and inheritance law. In print culture, religion consistently emphasizes contract over status while politics exhibits a downward-trending emphasis on contract versus status. VAR estimates reveal that ideas in caselaw and print culture coevolved.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47413,"journal":{"name":"Explorations in Economic History","volume":"97 ","pages":"Article 101696"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144241467","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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