This year’s Economic History Association meeting took place in Columbus, Ohio. It followed the usual format of short presentations, and designated discussants on each paper, as well as poster displays from graduate students. There were many excellent presentations, including some from European scholars or on European topics. Of particular interest to EHES members might be […]
Catching up or falling behind? Institutions, Geography and Economic Development of Eastern Europe in the Long Run
We look back on a summer school, hosted by the EHES, Humboldt-Universität and the London School of Economics and Political Science. Centered on the theme “Catching up or falling behind? Institutions, Geography and Economic Development of Eastern Europe in the Long Run”, the Summer School brought together experienced and young researchers working on Eastern European […]
The British Economy in Global Perspective, 1000-2000
The Department of Business and Economics at the University of Southern Denmark marked the start of the new academic year with a PhD course given by their Guest Professor Stephen Broadberry. The course, titled The British Economy in Global Perspective, 1000-2000, efficiently covered a millennium of British economic history in just three days. Professor Broadberry […]
Mismeasuring Long Run Growth. The Bias from Spliced National Accounts
Leandro Prados de la Escosurais Professor in Economic History atUniversidad Carlos III de Madrid Last April it was made public that Nigeria’s GDP figures for 2013 had been revised upwards by 89 per cent, as the base year for its calculation was brought forward from 1990 to 2010 (Financial Times April 7, 2014). As a result, […]
The Drivers of Long-run CO2 Emissions: A Global Perspective since 1800
New EHES working paper Climate change is regarded by many as the greatest environmental challenge faced by present and future generations. While public awareness and climate policy are recent developments, mankind’s activity has been contributing to the rise in CO2 emissions for more than two centuries. New research by Sofia Teives Henriques and Karol J. […]
State dissolution, sovereign debt and default: Lessons from the UK and Ireland, 1920-1938
New EHES working paper How do financial markets react to the dissolution of a sovereign state? Do dissolutions lead to sovereign defaults? Events in Scotland, Spain and the Ukraine underscore the importance of these questions. In the absence of recent case studies, historical studies can provide insight. A new EHES working paper studies the breakup […]
New EHES working paper
Fertility and early-life mortality. Evidence from smallpox vaccination in Sweden What is the causal effect of early-life mortality on fertility? Recent research by Philipp Ager, Casper W. Hansen and Peter S. Jensen sheds new light on this question by testing how the introduction of vaccination in Sweden at the end of 1801 affected early life […]
New EHES Working Paper
The Danish Agricultural Revolution in an Energy Perspective: A Case of Development with Few Domestic Energy Sources Is a lack of domestic energy resources necessarily a limiting factor to growth, as suggested for example by the work of Robert C. Allen? A new EHES Working Paper argues that this does not have to be the […]
Understanding the Economic Development of Eastern Europe
The WEast Economic History Workshop titled “Understanding the Economic Development of Eastern Europe” took place in Belgrade on the 5th and 6th July. The Belgrade WEast Workshop was organised by Jacob Weisdorf, Mikolaj Malinowski, Matthias Morys, Stefan Nikolić and the Belgrade Banking Academy. The purpose of WEast Workshops is to foster knowledge transfer and collaboration between economic […]
New EHES Working paper
Breaking the Unbreakable Union: Nationalism, Trade Disintegration and the Soviet Economic Collapse Why did the Soviet economy collapse so quickly in the late 1980s and early 1990s? A new EHES Working Paper argues that the reason can partly be found in the reemergence of nationalism to the territorial fringes of the Union. Leaders from Ukraine, […]