The New York Times reviews a forthcoming book by economic historian Gregory Clark, A Farewell to Alms, which presents new evidence and a novel argument for why the industrial revolution occurred when it did. The review places Clark squarely in the camp of historians who see a fundamental change occurring around 1800, although there have been others who have argued for an earlier or for a later “start date” to the Industrial Revolution.
I gather from the review that Clark’s argument hinges on a change in behavioral attitudes and the widespread adoption of “capitalist values” (or at least the values and attitudes necessary for a capitalist economy). The novelty in Clark’s work, apart from the considerable amount of new source material he has uncovered, is the part of his argument that suggests that the values necessary for capitalism could have been transmitted genetically.
For thousands of years, most people on earth lived in abject poverty, first as hunters and gatherers, then as peasants or laborers. But with the Industrial Revolution, some societies traded this ancient poverty for amazing affluence.
Historians and economists have long struggled to understand how this transition occurred and why it took place only in some countries. A scholar who has spent the last 20 years scanning medieval English archives has now emerged with startling answers for both questions.
Gregory Clark, an economic historian at the University of California, Davis, believes that the Industrial Revolution — the surge in economic growth that occurred first in England around 1800 — occurred because of a change in the nature of the human population. The change was one in which people gradually developed the strange new behaviors required to make a modern economy work. The middle-class values of nonviolence, literacy, long working hours and a willingness to save emerged only recently in human history, Dr. Clark argues.
Because they grew more common in the centuries before 1800, whether by cultural transmission or evolutionary adaptation, the English population at last became productive enough to escape from poverty, followed quickly by other countries with the same long agrarian past.
Dr. Clark’s ideas have been circulating in articles and manuscripts for several years and are to be published as a book next month, ‘A Farewell to Alms’ (Princeton University Press). Economic historians have high praise for his thesis, though many disagree with parts of it.
The final part of the review quotes several other prominent economic historians, including Kenneth Pomerantz, whose book The Great Divergence I am currently reading, and Robert P. Brenner, whose series of articles in Past and Present from the late 1970s and 1980s are basically “required reading” for any British or European historian. Both Pomerantz and Brenner are somewhat critical of Clark’s argument.
Dr. Clark says the middle-class values needed for productivity could have been transmitted either culturally or genetically. But in some passages, he seems to lean toward evolution as the explanation. “Through the long agrarian passage leading up to the Industrial Revolution, man was becoming biologically more adapted to the modern economic world,” he writes. And, “The triumph of capitalism in the modern world thus may lie as much in our genes as in ideology or rationality.”
What was being inherited, in his view, was not greater intelligence — being a hunter in a foraging society requires considerably greater skill than the repetitive actions of an agricultural laborer. Rather, it was “a repertoire of skills and dispositions that were very different from those of the pre-agrarian world.”
Reaction to Dr. Clark’s thesis from other economic historians seems largely favorable, although few agree with all of it, and many are skeptical of the most novel part, his suggestion that evolutionary change is a factor to be considered in history.
Historians used to accept changes in people’s behavior as an explanation for economic events, like Max Weber’s thesis linking the rise of capitalism with Protestantism. But most have now swung to the economists’ view that all people are alike and will respond in the same way to the same incentives. Hence they seek to explain events like the Industrial Revolution in terms of changes in institutions, not people.
Dr. Clark’s view is that institutions and incentives have been much the same all along and explain very little, which is why there is so little agreement on the causes of the Industrial Revolution. In saying the answer lies in people’s behavior, he is asking his fellow economic historians to revert to a type of explanation they had mostly abandoned and in addition is evoking an idea that historians seldom consider as an explanatory variable, that of evolution.
Most historians have assumed that evolutionary change is too gradual to have affected human populations in the historical period. But geneticists, with information from the human genome now at their disposal, have begun to detect ever more recent instances of human evolutionary change like the spread of lactose tolerance in cattle-raising people of northern Europe just 5,000 years ago. A study in the current American Journal of Human Genetics finds evidence of natural selection at work in the population of Puerto Rico since 1513. So historians are likely to be more enthusiastic about the medieval economic data and elaborate time series that Dr. Clark has reconstructed than about his suggestion that people adapted to the Malthusian constraints of an agrarian society.
“He deserves kudos for assembling all this data,” said Dr. Hoffman, the Caltech historian, “but I don’t agree with his underlying argument.”
The decline in English interest rates, for example, could have been caused by the state’s providing better domestic security and enforcing property rights, Dr. Hoffman said, not by a change in people’s willingness to save, as Dr. Clark asserts.
The natural-selection part of Dr. Clark’s argument “is significantly weaker, and maybe just not necessary, if you can trace the changes in the institutions,” said Kenneth L. Pomeranz, a historian at the University of California, Irvine. In a recent book, “The Great Divergence,” Dr. Pomeranz argues that tapping new sources of energy like coal and bringing new land into cultivation, as in the North American colonies, were the productivity advances that pushed the old agrarian economies out of their Malthusian constraints.
Robert P. Brenner, a historian at the University of California, Los Angeles, said although there was no satisfactory explanation at present for why economic growth took off in Europe around 1800, he believed that institutional explanations would provide the answer and that Dr. Clark’s idea of genes for capitalist behavior was “quite a speculative leap.”
Dr. Bowles, the Santa Fe economist, said he was “not averse to the idea” that genetic transmission of capitalist values is important, but that the evidence for it was not yet there. “It’s just that we don’t have any idea what it is, and everything we look at ends up being awfully small,” he said. Tests of most social behaviors show they are very weakly heritable.
He also took issue with Dr. Clark’s suggestion that the unwillingness to postpone consumption, called time preference by economists, had changed in people over the centuries. “If I were as poor as the people who take out payday loans, I might also have a high time preference,” he said.
Dr. Clark said he set out to write his book 12 years ago on discovering that his undergraduates knew nothing about the history of Europe. His colleagues have been surprised by its conclusions but also interested in them, he said.
“The actual data underlying this stuff is hard to dispute,” Dr. Clark said. “When people see the logic, they say ‘I don’t necessarily believe it, but it’s hard to dismiss.’ ”
The complete review from The New York Times:
British History
Posted Wednesday, August 1st, 2007 at 3:55 am
Today’s article in The Guardian about the end of British military operations in Northern Ireland included a phrase I thought noteworthy. The end of Operation Banner was “an event without ceremony” according to the army. So much of Britain’s presence in the world has been defined by ceremony that I am reflecting on what this phrase means.
Also of note is the fact that the headquarters of the British military in Northern Ireland is a barracks named after village in France where the Memorial to the Missing from the First World War is erected.
It was, the army insisted yesterday, an event without ceremony - just the simple lowering of a flag inside Thiepval Barracks in Lisburn, headquarters of the military presence in Northern Ireland throughout the Troubles.
The complete article from The Guardian: “British Troops Leave After 38 Years”
British History
Posted Wednesday, August 1st, 2007 at 3:39 am
As a follow up to the end of British military operations in Northern Ireland, The Guardian has put together an online photo gallery with some really amazing pictures.
This photo shows a scene from when the solderiers first deployed 38 years ago:
And this photo, the last image in their series, is from 2000:
The complete slideshow from The Guardian is worth looking at: “Gallery - the end of Operation Banner”
British History
Posted Tuesday, July 31st, 2007 at 4:00 pm
Just about now, at 11:59pm BDT on July 31, 2007, Britain’s military operations in Northern Ireland come to an end.
There was a bunch of press coverage about it here in London today, and I think that even though it is something of an afterthought considering the political peace process that has been at work for some time it is still a meaningful moment in the history of the United Kingdom.
Even more that the end of British rule in Hong Kong ten years ago, this represents a final moment in the story of European and British colonialism.
From The Guardian:
The British armys longest continuous military operation comes to an end at midnight when responsibility for security in Northern Ireland passes to the police.
Operation Banner lasted 38 years and involved 300,000 personnel, of whom 763 were killed by paramilitaries. The last soldier to die was Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick, who was shot at a vehicle checkpoint in 1997.
From tomorrow, there will still be a garrison of 5,000 troops in Ulster, but they will not be on active operations and will be available for deployment anywhere in the world.Security will become the responsibility of the Northern Ireland police, and the British soldiers will have a limited role in supporting them.
The complete article from The Guardian: “British army ends Northern Ireland operation”
British History
Posted Friday, July 20th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
Yesterday Gordon Brown’s government announced that it would be putting off the reform of the House of Lords that has already been put off several times before. Obviously it is a very complicated and contentious issue, and it may be a good decision to wait until after the next general election so there is more of a national consensus about what should be done (among other things this may prevent a potential constitutional crisis by making the current Lords members feel more pressure to accept the final proposal.
One point in The Guardian’s report reminded me of the truly odd and ironic nature of the British Government:
In March the Commons voted overwhelmingly, in a free vote, for a 100% elected Lords, and with a 38-vote majority for an 80% elected Lords. There was a 280 vote majority for removing the remaining 92 hereditary peers, left over from the previous attempt at Lords reform in 1999.
In a bizarre paradox, those 92 hereditary peers are, in fact, the only elected members of the Lords, as their places were endorsed in a ballot of their fellow hereditary peers when the government got rid of 900-plus Lords eight years ago.
The complete article from The Guardian“Straw to unveil Lords reform plans”
British History
Posted Tuesday, July 3rd, 2007 at 12:27 pm
Gordon Brown decided to back off from his idea to revise the Act of Settlement 1701 to exclude its discrimination against Catholics holding public office. The Act fixed the line of succession to the English throne, and ensured that it would be forever “English” and Protestant.
It was necessary in order to pass the English throne to Sophia of Hanover, a Protestant, who was a granddaughter of James I. It explicitly provided that only Sophia’s heirs could claim the throne, and that they must be Protestant.
And it was thereby further enacted, that all and every person and persons that then were, or afterwards should be reconciled to, or shall hold communion with the see or Church of Rome, or should profess the popish religion, or marry a papist, should be excluded, and are by that Act made for ever incapable to inherit, possess, or enjoy the Crown and government of this realm, and Ireland, and the dominions thereunto belonging, or any part of the same, or to have, use, or exercise any regal power, authority, or jurisdiction within the same: and in all and every such case and cases the people of these realms shall be and are thereby absolved of their allegiance: and that the said Crown and government shall from time to time descend to and be enjoyed by such person or persons, being Protestants, as should have inherited and enjoyed the same, in case the said person or persons, so reconciled, holding communion, professing or marrying, as aforesaid, were naturally dead.
Although this language, and most of the Act itself, seems very antiquated and hardly seems like it could be relevant in the twenty first century, there are real consequences for Britain so long as it retains the monarchy and the monarch serves as the head of the Church of England. Edward VIII’s abdication in the early twentieth century triggered provisions of the Act, and more recently Prince Michael of Kent’s marriage in 1978 to a Catholic removed him from the line of succession.
Repealing the Act, or modifying its anti-Catholic provisions has been the subject of political debate on and off in Britain over the years. Gordon Brown’s proposals for a Bill of Rights that would enshrine religious toleration seemed like the closest the nation has come to an outright repeal. As today’s Telegraph indicates, Brown is dropping any revision of the Act:
Gordon Brown has been attacked by leading Catholics for his decision to abandon a plan to end discrimination against the faith in his white paper on constitutional change.
Cardinal Keith O’Brien, archbishop of Saint Andrews and Edinburgh, said he was “deeply disappointed” in the Prime Minister.
Cardinal O’Brien has campaigned along with Scotland’s first minister, Alex Salmond, for a repeal of the 1701 Act of Settlement, which enshrines the link between the Church of England and the roles of monarch and prime minister.
Mr Brown had planned to end the link by creating a written Bill of Rights which would have said for the first time that people holding public office could be of any faith.
“I remain deeply concerned that the Act of Settlement will continue to exist and believe it constitutes state-sponsored sectarianism,” Cardinal O’Brien said.
Although it seems to those outside of England (as well as many English) that the Act is blatantly discriminatory as well as unnecessary in an age when the political power of the monarchy is minimal, the Act has its staunch supporters. Some believe in it not just because it represents tradition and an abstract notion of English Protestant identity, but also because they fervently believe in the principle of a Protestant monarchy.
Adrian Hilton, writing in support of the Act in The Spectator in 2003, (“The Price of Liberty”, The Spectator, November 8, 2003) elaborated a number of reasons why its repeal or revision would be unwise. Apart from the legal difficulties it would create in terms of the new laws necessary to counter-act it in Britain, amending the Act would open a legal can of worms in every Commonwealth nation with the Queen as Head of State because they are currently subject to its terms and would need to pass their own succession laws if it was repealed.
Hilton’s most interesting point is his assertion, “Parliament went to great lengths to make the Act foundational because the nation had learnt that when a Roman Catholic monarch is upon the throne, religious and civil liberty is lost.” Even at a time when Christian religion is on a decline in Britain and Church of England membership is at a low, English identity, rights and liberties are still tied to its Protestantism and its history.
The complete article from The Daily Telegraph: “Catholics attack Brown over discrimination law”
British History, European History
Posted Monday, July 2nd, 2007 at 12:45 am
The new British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, is planned some fairly dramatic overhauling of the constitution. Two of the rumored items stand out the most: the change in the Prime Minister’s power to declare war and the creation of a British Bill of Rights. The article makes no mention of what the process would be for declaring war. It would certainly be interesting if this power was given back to the sovereign, but most likely it would end up requiring a full Parliamentary vote.
Gordon Brown will this week propose surrendering historic powers delegated to previous prime ministers by the monarch as part of a wide-ranging programme of constitutional reform.
The reforms are expected to involve Mr Brown giving up royal prerogatives traditionally exercised by the prime minister, such as the power to declare war without parliamentary approval or to appoint bishops to the Church of England.
If that is the case, it becomes something of a distinction without much of a difference, because presumably the Prime Minister has the confidence of the majority in the House of Commons, and if s/he proposed a declaration of war, it is likely that a majority would de-facto agree. Of course this became a bit more complication with the Iraq war when growing number of Labour MPs disagreed with Prime Minister Blair’s decision to go to war and to continue the war. It seems like Brown’s move would be more designed to signal his own MPs that he learned a lesson from Blair’s Iraq experience.
The article also suggests that Brown is considering a Bill of Rights:
The House of Commons will be given new powers, including the right for MPs to recall Parliament during a recess if there is a national emergency, to hold American-style confirmation hearings for appointees to key public posts and to ratify international treaties.
In the longer term, Mr Brown is considering a British Bill of Rights, enshrining the civil liberties of citizens currently set out in the Human Rights Act and European Convention on Human Rights, to give a greater sense of what it means to be a British citizen.
Without yet knowing the details of the proposal it is difficult to think about what consequences this might have for Britain. But, it would certainly be historic, considering how Britain has never had an official, inviolable Bill of Rights before. It will be interesting to see how such a document is crafted and what procedures are implemented for amending it (a Parliamentary super-majority? nationwide referendum? etc.)
Although the article frames it as an issue of British citizenship and defining the legal meaning of British-ness, there is also the suggestion of the link with the European human rights conventions. With this Bill of Rights, Brown might be trying to pre-empt some of the remaining differences between British laws and EU ones by crafting a document that nullifies a bunch of other laws that might contradict EU regulations.
A lot of speculation on my part, but it seems that there is more than just legal reforms going on here. It will be interesting to see what proposals Brown eventually puts forward as well as how they are received in Britain.
The complete article from The Daily Telegraph: “Brown gives up the power to declare war”
British History
Posted Thursday, June 28th, 2007 at 10:30 pm
The last British governor of Hong Kong, Lord Chris Patten, reflects on the handover of the territory to China which took place ten years ago on July 1, 1997.
Ten years ago this weekend, Chris Patten’s job as governor of Hong Kong came to an end - and with it 150 years of British rule.
Amid a tropical downpour, Mr Patten, along with the Prince of Wales, new Prime Minister Tony Blair and other dignitaries, saw the British flag lowered in the territory for the last time on 30 June 1997.
It was an emotional moment, says the former governor who was made a Lord in 2004. Both he and his family had come to love Hong Kong during their five years there. He still calls it the best job he ever had.
Lord Patten had insisted upon a ceremony of some pomp, rather than a more functional handover in the city hall that had initially been favoured by the Chinese.
“I felt there should be a proper farewell in order to demonstrate to the world that Hong Kong, a free city, was seeing transfer of its sovereignty to an authoritarian government,” he said.
One of the other interesting aspects of the interview is Lord Patten’s humorous explanation about how he came to be appointed governor in the first place.
Lord Patten jokes that the last governor of Hong Kong was “slightly improbably” chosen by the citizens of Bath - who voted him out as their MP in the 1992 general election.
The humor aside, I think it is a typical example of the sort of interconnectedness present through the history of the British Empire. Although the links between different parts of the world certainly remain, it now seems all the more improbable that a British constituency could “cause” a certain person to be a ruler of a place more than half way around the world.
I was also fascinated by the description of Lord Patten’s relationship with the people of Hong Kong which also seems to reflect some of the sentiments present in other times and places of the British Empire.
As for Hong Kong, the man who was affectionately known as “Fatty Pang” (Pang being the Chinese transliteration of Patten) says he has returned several times in the past 10 years and gets a reception “rather like an ageing rock star”.
The complete story from BBC News: “Last British governor of Hong Kong”
British History, European History
Posted Sunday, June 24th, 2007 at 11:25 pm
Men who wear kilts in Great Britain may soon by subject to new legal regulations designed to protect endangered animals whose fur is frequently used for the “sporran” piece.
The BBC reports:
Kilt wearers could face prosecution if they do not have a licence for their sporran under new legislation which has been introduced in Scotland.
The laws are designed to protect endangered species like badgers and otters, whose fur used to be favoured by sporran makers.
The legislation applies to animals killed after 1994.
Applicants must prove that the animal was killed lawfully before they will be able to get a licence.
The conservation regulations were designed to close a number of loopholes and bring Scotland into line with other EU members.
It’s interesting that the law will require an individual to prove affirmatively that an animal was killed lawfully, rather than placing the burden of regulation on sellers of the items or manufacturers.
It also seems like the law would be difficult to enforce.
Still, what is most noteworthy to me about this story is the way that things associated with “tradition” in the United Kingdom (whether they actually represent a “real” cultural tradition is another point entirely) are being chipped away. Although the UK clings strongly to many particular traditions that are not in line with the EU (most notably retaining its currency), there is a general attempt, of which this story is one specific example, to comply with ever more rules and regulations originating in Europe.
The complete story from BBC News: “Sporran wearers may need licence”
