Capitalism in Context
Essays on Economic Development and Cultural Change in Honor of R.M.Hartwell

These essays explore the cultural contexts and institutional constraints that have shaped growth and development over the past two centuries. This book offers new perspectives on why economic development took place where and when it did.

Following the approach of R.M. Hartwell, the influential historian of the British Industrial Revolution, these essays explore the cultural contexts and institutional constraints that have shaped growth and development over the past two centuries. This book offers new perspectives on why economic development took place where and when it did. The chapters cover: social progress during economic development; the influence of cultural values on social and economic change; economic foundations of development - labour, capital and technology; and organizational arrangements - property rights, government and markets. These studies should appeal to economists, historians and social scientists alike for their treatments of economic development and cultural change.

Preface
Introduction by John A. James and Mark Thomas
Pt. I: The Profile of Progress
1: Patterns of Growth in History
Eric L. Jones
2: Frontier Societies and the Diffusion of Growth
Mark Thomas
3: Reflections on "The Standard of Living Debate": New Arguments and New Evidence
Stanley L. Engerman
Pt. II: The Cultural Foundations: Values, Markets, and Peoples
4: Puritanism and Capitalism in Early Massachusetts
Stephen Innes
5: The Rise of Free Labor: Economic Change and the Enforcement of Service Contracts in England, 1351-1875
David W. Galenson
6: Cemeteries, Religion, and the Culture of Capitalism
Thomas W. Laqueur
Pt. III: The Economic Foundations: Labor, Capital, and Technology
7: Leaving the Farm to Go to the City: Did They Leave Quickly Enough?
Jeffrey G. Williamson
8: Human Capital and Productivity in Advanced Economies
N. F. R. Crafts
9: Savings, Investment, and Economic Growth: The United States in the Nineteenth Century
Lance E. Davis, Robert E. Gallman.
10: Progress and Inertia in Technological Change
Joel Mokyr Pt. IV: The Organizational Foundations: Property Rights, Government, and Markets
11: The Evolution of Efficient Markets in History
Douglass C. North
12: The Political Economy of Institutional Change: Property Rights and the General Revision Act of 1891
Gary D. Libecap
13: Government Growth, Income Growth, and Economic Growth
John J. Wallis
Postscript
The Writings of R. M. Hartwell
References
Contributors
Index