Classical economics and the Great Irish Famine:A study in limits

The Great Irish Famine resulted from two massive failures: the blight that destroyed the potato crop and the non-interventionism of the English government. The first failure, which also occurred in other European countries, was devastating for the Irish who depended on the potato as their main source of nourishment. The second failure was a human failure because English government policy was instructed by classical economics to let the market clear the surplus population from the land and was reinforced by the anti-Irish racism common in England at the time, even among classical economists, notably Nassau Senior and J.S. Mill. For most of the 19th century, the English answer was to ignore the hate and crush the crime which [the land system] produced. In the forty years before 1870 forty-two Coercion Acts were passed. During the same period there was not a single statute to protect the Irish peasant from eviction and rack-renting.—Winston Churchill, The Great Democracies,p. 343. It is commonplace in economic research to assume that the investigator has removed all traces of personal values from his/her work. As Becker (1961, p. 10) implies, that could be a serious error. For that reason, let me state at the outset that I am a first-generation Irish-American, holding dual citizenship in the United States and the Republic of Ireland. My mother and father both were born and raised in County Mayo—the poorest county in western Ireland, where the toll in human lives lost during the Great Famine was staggering. I do not know how many of my own Irish ancestors suffered and died during the Great Famine. What I do know and acknowledge is that my selection of this topic clearly is related to that family background which also very likely influenced the way I have interpreted the evidence presented herein. I concede that someone else sifting through the evidence might come to different conclusions, but I know of no other way to proceed. Supportive comments by Hans Jensen and Peter Danner on earlier drafts are gratefully acknowledged, as are the suggestions made by the editor and an anonymous referee. Any remaining errors are entirely mine.     

Large-scale mortality shocks and the Great Irish Famine 1845–1852

This paper considers the consequences of a large scale mortality shock arising from a famine or epidemic for long run economic and demographic development. The Great Irish Famine of 1845–1852 is taken as a case-study and is incorporated as an exogenous mortality shock into the type of long-run unified growth theory pioneered by Galor and Weil (1999, 2000), and modelled by Lagerlöf (2003a,b) among others. Through calibration, the impact of such a mortality shock occurring on the cusp of a country's transition from a Malthusian to a Modern Growth regime is then depicted.     

Stunting and selection effects of famine: A case study of the Great Chinese Famine

Many developing countries experience famine. If survival is related to height, the increasingly common practice of using height as a measure of well-being may be misleading. We devise a novel method for disentangling the stunting from the selection effects of famine. Using data from the 1959-1961 Great Chinese Famine, we find that taller children were more likely to survive the famine. Controlling for selection, we estimate that children under the age of five who survived the famine grew up to be 1 to 2 cm shorter. Our results suggest that if a country experiences a shock such as famine, average height is potentially a biased measure of economic conditions during childhood.     

The conspicuous absence of examination questions concerning the Great Irish Famine: political economy as science and ideology *

To advance our general understanding about the development of nine-teenth-century Irish political economy in the wake of the Great Irish Famine (1846–51), this article analyses the Famine's impact on a previously unstudied, yet uniquely authoritative, element of the displine: the questions given to candidates for the Whately Professorship of Political Economy at Trinity College, Dublin from 1832 to 1882. This article concludes, contrary to previous arguments, that the Famine did not fundamentaly influence the discipline's development, and relates this conclusion to debates over whether and how political economy functioned as an ideology in shaping policy responses to the Famine.     

Behavioural economics: Classical and modern

Abstract

In this paper, the origins and development of behavioural economics, beginning with the pioneering works of Herbert Simon and Ward Edwards, are traced and (critically) discussed. Two kinds of behavioural economics – classical and modern – are attributed, respectively, to the two pioneers. The mathematical foundations of classical behavioural economics are identified, largely, to be in the theory of computation and computational complexity; the mathematical basis for modern behavioural economics is claimed to be a notion of subjective probability. Individually rational economic theories of behaviour, with attempts to broaden – and deepen – the notion of rationality, challenging its orthodox variants, were decisively influenced by these two mathematical underpinnings.     

关于大饥荒研究中的几个问题

本文指出<"大跃进"运动与中国1958-1961年饥荒:集权体制下的国家、集体与农民>和<从退堂权的失而复得看"大跃进"饥荒的成因和教训>两文中的几个问题,这些也是近年来研究中国大饥荒的文献中争论最多的问题:(1)森的饥荒理论框架同样适用于计划经济体制,饥荒的发生本质上是因为食物获取权的失败;(2)粮食征购率的解释在统计上可能存在问题,其解释能力可能被高估;(3)公共食堂机制可能更多反映了政策的激进程度,而公共食堂本身只是一个副产品;(4)将不同层面的解释融合在一起时可能各自混淆,集体提留与分配体制只是同一问题的不同方面而已.     

中国"大跃进"饥荒成因再辩-政治权利的视角

针对杨涛和范子英提出的评论意见,本文再次澄清以下问题:森的食物获取权理论是否适用于计划经济下的饥荒分析,"大跃进"运动中农村人民公社的集体高积累是否减少了农民口粮消费,大饥荒成因实证研究中的计量问题.最后,本文提出,发展一个包括政治权利在内的饥荒理论,是深入理解社会主义计划经济下饥荒问题的钥匙.     

约束的界限——转轨经济学中的所有权和硬预算约束

文献认为，硬预算约束可以促使公司采取必要的重组行为。本文认为，金融约束难以弥补公司治理结构的不足。以后共产主义的转轨经济资料为基础，本文认为成功的收入重组需要内含在一定所有权类型中的企业家动力。另外，国有公司将继续引起比民营化公司更高的信贷风险，因而硬预算约束政策的效用会减弱。虽然债权人的“软弱”在很多方面是不利的，但如果这可以防止那些原则上能够通过转让所有权而成功实现重组的公司不至于倒闭，那么，这就不一定不合理。     

探讨大饥荒的成因:集权、计划失误与政治行为的影响

本文评述此期<经济学(季刊)>关于中国大饥荒成因的两篇论文,并提出一个"大跃进"期间,国家集权、计划经济失误和干部政治行为相互作用,促发并加剧大饥荒的思路.     

指标管理的失败：“大跃进”与困难时期的官员造假行为

论文从高指标、高压出发,分析了20世纪50年代末到60年代初的“大跃进”与困难时期的官员造假基础,指出指标考核让造假成为官场的一种游戏规则,趋利避害是官员的正常行为。论文分析了几类造假动机和几种官员的造假,最后指出指标考核弊病的危害。     

"大跃进"运动与中国1958-1961年饥荒-集权体制下的国家、集体与农民

1958-1961年中国发生人类历史上最为严重的饥荒,现有研究从粮食供给下降、公共食堂、城市偏向政策、缺粮区偏向、政治激进主义、政府救济不力及饥荒的历史记忆角度对大饥荒成因提出了不同的解释.在赶超战略及"大跃进"运动的背景下,本文考察了人民公社内部分配制度,发现"大跃进"运动时期人民公社大幅度提高集体积累,农民个体可消费粮食急剧下降,这可能是"大跃进"饥荒的另一重要成因.本文利用1953-1966年省级面板数据证明了上述假说,并提出集权体制下农民个体政治权利的缺失是传统社会主义饥荒频发的主要原因.     

再论公共食堂退出权在"大跃进"饥荒中的作用

针对杨涛和范子英的评论意见,本文沿着"大跃进"饥荒爆发、加剧及结束的先后顺序再次厘清以下问题:1958年粮食产量及需要高体力消耗的各种大型工程是否导致饥荒爆发、公共食堂在庐山会议前后的解散和恢复如何分别减轻和加剧了饥荒、公共食堂制度的度量问题及饥荒的结束是缘于达尔文效应还是政策转向等.本文提出,赋予个人自由选择权是解决类似饥荒这样的人类社会矛盾冲突的可行方法.     

Holding back from theory: limits and methodological alternatives of randomized field experiments in development economics

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we critically and constructively examine the methodology of evidence-based development economics, which deploys randomized field experiments (RFEs) as its main tool. We describe the context in which this movement started, and illustrate in detail how RFEs are designed and implemented in practice, drawing on a series of experiments by Pascaline Dupas and her colleagues on the use of bednets, saving and governance in Kenya. We show that this line of experiments have evolved to address the limitation of obtaining policy-relevant insights from RFEs alone, characterized as their lack of external validity in the literature. After examining the two prominent responses by leading figures of evidence-based development economics, namely machine learning and structured speculation, we propose an alternative methodological strategy that incorporates two sub-fields, namely experimental economics and behavioral economics, to complement RFEs in investigating the data-generating process underlying the treatment effects of RFEs. This strategy highlights promising methodological developments in RFEs neither captured by the two proposals nor recognized by methodologists, and also guides how to combine different sub-fields of economics.     

从退堂权的失而复得看"大跃进"饥荒的成因和教训

本文旨在利用最新的历史资料,采取历史逻辑方法,并从自由退出权的丧失和复得的经济学意义,揭示以剥夺自留地、取消家庭副业、对农民的全部口粮实行强制性集体化为标志的公共食堂的兴起、散伙、重新加强和最后的迅速解散,与"大跃进"饥荒的爆发、加剧及突然终结在时间上的重叠并非偶然,而是与这一退出权的丧失和复得有着深刻的内在因果关系.     

Environmental and resource economics: A Canadian retrospective

The paper reviews research contributions to environmental and resource economics by scholars in Canada. We focus mainly on work from the past 25 years but also highlight earlier pathbreaking work. We begin by looking at broad trends in research both internationally and within Canada. We then review Canadian contributions to various topics in the field. Canadians have played a leading role in the development of the field, especially in resource economics, international environmental economics and the valuation of environmental amenities.     

Technology and transaction cost economics: A reply

I argue here, as I have previously, that technology is neither fully determinative of nor irrelevant to economic organization. Transaction cost economizing occupies a prominent position in any effort to assess the efficacy of alternative forms of economic organization.     

Towards applied geographical economics: modelling relative wage rates,incomes and prices for the regions of Great Britain

One of the key issues surrounding geographical economics is whether the theory can be made operational, so that proper investigations can be made of the basic theoretical assumptions and practical use can be made of the model's predictions at a detailed spatial level. In this paper the model formalized by Fujita et al. (1999 Fujita, M, Krugman, PR and Venables, A. 1999. The Spatial Economy: Cities, Regions, and International Trade, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) is developed in the context of 36 regions of Great Britain, enabling direct comparisons with observed wage rate data that are used to calibrate the model. Iceberg transport costs are in the form of an exponential function and a power function. For the range of parameters considered, the power function gives a better fit between model and data, suggesting scale economies in transportation. The paper shows that, in spite of the assumptions that have to be made, quite realistic distributions of relative wages, income and prices are attainable. However, caution is required in the interpretation of these simulations, which in no way provide proof of New Economic Geography theory, which clearly has limitations. Nonetheless it is hoped that the work reported in this paper does help to advance the progress of geographical economics theory towards empirical verification.