What can we learn from a race with one runner? A comment on Foreman‐Peck and Zhou, ‘Late marriage as a contributor to the industrial revolution in England’

Foreman‐Peck and Zhou's claim that late marriage was a major contributor to the industrial revolution in England cannot be sustained. They consider neither other influences on English industrialization nor other European economies where marriage age was high throughout the early modern period but industrialization came much later. It is not possible to argue that late marriage age was a major contributor to English industrialization without analysing other possible contributing factors. Any consideration of this question must assess marriage age alongside other causes of industrialization and explain why other European economies with a higher marriage age industrialized much later than England.     

Is it still helpful to talk about proto‐industrialization? Some suggestions from a Catalan case study

The concept of proto‐industrialization is considered by many historians to have outlived its usefulness. This article seeks to argue the contrary, using a case study from Catalonia, in southern Europe, which provides a rare example of early industrialization on the periphery of Europe. Using an in‐depth study of an important proto‐industrial community, Igualada, the article puts forward two key arguments. First, it shows how the proto‐industrialization of the woollen industry and later the cotton industry shaped the transition to the factory. There were important continuities throughout in terms of human capital and organization of production; in particular, the persistence of the family as unit of production. Second, the impact of proto‐industrialization on the family economy is shown to have had important consequences for demographic behaviour. As in other areas of Europe, there was a notable impact on age at marriage and on marital fertility. Equally important, however, was the impact on mortality and migration, aspects that have been neglected by historians. In particular, the high infant and child mortality rates for Igualada suggest that historians need to rethink the effect of proto‐industrialization upon life chances.     

Cottage industry,migration, and marriage in nineteenth‐century England

There has been considerable debate concerning the impact of the industrial employment of women upon their demographic behaviour in nineteenth‐century England. This article assesses the impact of employment in the cottage industry of straw plait and hat making in the county of Hertfordshire, comparing and contrasting districts where the industry was prominent with those where it was not. It is discovered that in 1851 the availability of straw industry employment encouraged earlier marriage, most notably in those parishes where the industry was particularly heavily concentrated, although overall levels of nuptiality and proportions ultimately marrying were similar in straw and non‐straw areas alike. By 1871, however, the skewed sex ratio that such employment produced among young adults served to offset this positive effect. As the industry waned in the later nineteenth century, the experience of different regions of the county converged, while throughout the period the data suggest that urban/rural contrasts and the suburbanization of London produced more stark contrasts in female marriage patterns than did the availability of cottage industry employment.     

Wealth inequality in Sweden, 1750–1900†

This article examines the evolution of wealth inequality in Sweden from 1750 to 1900, contributing both to the debate on early modern and modern inequality and to the general debate on the pattern of inequality during industrialization. The pre‐industrial period (1750–1850) is for the first time examined for Sweden at the national level. The study uses a random sample of probate inventories from urban and rural areas across the country, adjusted for age and social class. Estimates are provided for the years 1750, 1800, 1850, and 1900. The results show a gradual growth in inequality as early as the mid‐eighteenth century, with the sharpest rise in the late nineteenth century. Whereas the early growth in inequality was connected to changes in the countryside and in agriculture, the later growth was related to industrialization encompassing both compositional effects and strong wealth accumulation among the richest. The level of inequality in Sweden in 1750 was lower than for other western European countries, but by 1900 Sweden was just as unequal.     

Gender,ethnicity, and unequal opportunity in colonial Uganda: European influences,African realities,and the pitfalls of parish register data

The renaissance of African economic history in the past decade has opened up new research avenues for studying the long‐term social and economic development of Africa. A sensitive treatment of African realities in the evaluation of European colonial legacies and a critical stance towards the use of new sources and approaches is crucial. In this article, we engage with a recent article by Meier zu Selhausen and Weisdorf to show how selection biases in, and Eurocentric interpretations of, parish registers have provoked an overly optimistic account of European influences on the educational and occupational opportunities of African men and women. We confront their dataset, drawn from the marriage registers of the Anglican Cathedral in Kampala, with Uganda's 1991 census, and show that trends in the literacy and numeracy of men and women born in Kampala lagged half a century behind those who wedded in Namirembe Cathedral. We run a regression analysis showing that access to schooling during the colonial era was unequal along lines of gender and ethnicity. We foreground the role of Africans in the spread of education, and we argue that European influences were not just diffusive but also divisive, and that gender inequality was reconfigured rather than eliminated under colonial rule.     

The impact of drought in early fourteenth‐century England

Climatic change is currently viewed as one of the main causes of the so‐called crisis of the early fourteenth century. It is well established that England saw increased storminess and heavy rainfall in this period, but this article suggests that the impact of drought—which became a common feature of the English climate during the 1320s and early 1330s—has been overlooked. Based primarily on a detailed analysis of account rolls for over 60 of the best‐documented manors in this period, the article establishes that drought brought devastating harvest failure and caused severe outbreaks of a number of diseases, plausibly including enteric infections, malaria, and winter and spring fevers. As a result, mortality surged and population levels fell in communities in affected regions, which were mainly confined to the southern and eastern counties of England. The article concludes that such regional variation significantly affects our understanding of demographic, agricultural, and even fiscal trends in this period. Although we should not disregard the human factors influencing the impact of environmental shocks, England was plainly struck with indubitable force by extreme weather in this pivotal phase of the medieval economy.     

A model of intermarriage involving attribute exchange

The increasing pace of globalization has significantly affected our lives in many profound ways. One of the consequences of globalization is the rise of intermarriage, i.e., the marriage between couples of different nationalities or different social, economic, religious, or racial backgrounds. Since our understanding of intermarriage is limited, this paper attempts to shed lights on intermarriage by developing a formal model based on attribute exchange. After examining the motivation and micro and macro consequences of intermarriages, our model shows that different value systems regarding marital attributes among different groups drive individuals with attributes valued lower in their group to seek intermarriage. As a result, the essence of intermarriages is the movement of attributes from groups in which such attributes are relatively abundant to groups where the same attributes are relatively scarce. Thus, intermarriage makes individuals with attributes valued lower in their original groups better off. At the inter‐societal (or inter‐group) level, the equilibrium of intermarriage is determined by the relative scarcity of marital attributes in different groups (societies). In the long run, intermarriages converge different groups in terms of their value systems regarding marriage.     

The Corn Laws and English wheat prices, 1815–1846

The British Corn Laws of the nineteenth century are the classic example of a trade barrier. This paper evaluates their importance to English society by analyzing the effects of the Corn Laws on wheat markets. Import supply elasticities are estimated for all of England's major grain supply markets, using data on prices, quantities, and freight costs from each country. A partial equilibrium trade arbitrage model is then constructed. In the absence of the Corn Laws, prices would have been 9 percent lower and consumption about 1.5 percent greater. The Corn Laws were, therefore, of great social and economic importance as England moved into the period of industrialization.     

Social class and the fertility transition: a critical comment on the statistical results reported in Simon Szreter's Fertility,class and gender in Britain, 1860–19401

Simon Szreter's book Fertility, class and gender in Britain, 1860–1940 argues that social and economic class fails to explain the cross‐sectional differences in marital fertility as reported in the 1911 census of England and Wales. Szreter's conclusion made the book immediately influential, and it remains so. This finding matters a great deal for debates about the causes of the European fertility decline of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. For decades scholars have argued whether the main forces at work were ideational or social and economic. This note reports a simple graphical and statistical re‐analysis of Szreter's own data. We show that social class does explain cross‐sectional differences in English marital fertility in 1911.     

Linguistic and Religious Influences on Foreign Trade: Evidence from East Asia*

Using a modified gravity model and the cross‐sectional data of East Asian economies, the present paper presents evidence that supports the view that the effect of distance‐related transaction costs on trade tends to fall over time. Overall religious influence on foreign trade exists in the post‐Cold War period but not during the Cold War period. The effects of language on inter‐regional trade and of religion on intra‐regional trade both weaken over time. In all cases, religion tends to have more significant influences on intra‐regional trade than language, and language tends to exert more significant influences on inter‐regional trade than religion. Finally, from 1985 to 1995 there is an indication that: (i) English becomes more important for inter‐regional trade; (ii) Bahasa, English and Khmer become less important for intra‐regional trade; and (iii) Chinese plays an increasing role in both intra‐regional and inter‐regional trade.     

Worth,age, and social status in early modern England1

This article introduces a new source for assessing the distribution of wealth in early modern England derived from witness depositions taken by the church courts. It discusses the accuracy of statements of ‘worth’ provided by thousands of witnesses between the mid‐sixteenth and later seventeenth centuries, and uses the monetary estimates of worth in goods that the majority of deponents supplied to assess the changing distribution of personal wealth. We argue that this data supports recent claims that the pre‐industrial English economy experienced significant levels of economic growth, while showing that its benefits were increasingly unevenly distributed between different social groups. In particular, the century after 1550 witnessed spectacular increases in yeoman worth that outstripped inflation by a factor of 10. The relative wealth of yeomen was also underpinned by its more secure distribution over the life cycle which further compounded the differences between them and other social groups.     

The first Sterling Area†

Between the eleventh century and mid‐thirteenth century a Sterling Area evolved in the British Isles, with a common currency based upon the English silver penny and equivalents of it produced in Scotland and Ireland. This Sterling Area began to contract in the second half of the fourteenth century, when reductions in the bullion content of Scottish coins ended the equivalence of the English and Scottish currencies, and in the fifteenth century Ireland developed its own coinage. Estimates of the currency of the Sterling Area are provided, taking the chronology of its growth and contraction into account. Estimates of the sterling currency are not estimates of the currency of England, and they cannot be combined with data relating exclusively to England in economic modelling, without qualification. Per capita currency estimates and values of coin hoards and single coin finds are at a high level around 1400, falling in the second half of the fifteenth century, indicating that the European ‘bullion famine’ of the 1390s to c. 1415 had less effect on the currency than the second late medieval bullion crisis, from the 1430s to the 1460s.     

The English monetary economy,c. 973–1100: the contribution of single‐finds1

A body of nearly 2,000 English finds of individual coins minted c. 973–1100 is surveyed as evidence for the scale and form of the monetary economy. A long‐term view indicates that this was a period of expansion in coin use, although growth in this area remained limited compared to the later middle ages, or even the eighth century. Within the eleventh century single‐finds suggest more specific developments, including a decline in coin use after the Norman Conquest, and substantial short‐term fluctuations related to various economic and monetary factors. Comparison with estimates of coin production suggests a general trend for more of mints' output to enter domestic circulation after c. 1030/40, though this need not solely reflect an increase in monetization. These chronological changes are compared with the pattern of circulation within England. Overall, the kingdom enjoyed a unified currency which did not see marked localization of coin circulation. Parts of northern England were less integrated with the south, but not so far as to suggest active exclusion of non‐local coin. More striking was a general trend for both production and circulation to be concentrated in the east and the south.     

English and Scottish overseas trade, 1300–16001

This article compares English and Scottish exports, from 1300–1600, using existing statistical data from England and a new data set of Scottish exports. It shows that the significant English and Scottish wool trades collapsed at almost identical rates. However, while England shifted towards exporting woollen cloth, a similar move in Scotland was weak—because of the poor quality of cloth and the urban form of the industry. In the second half of the sixteenth century, as English exports stagnated, Scottish trade began to grow, especially new and less‐established commodities. This ‘recovery’ was based on the heavy depreciation of the Scottish currency.     

Same‐sex relationship escalation with uncertain marriage legality: Theory and empirical implications

We develop a strategic model of same‐sex dating, cohabitation, and potential marriage with location‐specific marriage legality. With an initial illegal location, couples bargain over a relationship path that internalizes the probability of future legalization and potential migration‐for‐marriage. Our model generates testable, empirical implications on relationship hazard rates, migration, and utility due to changes in migration costs and legalization probabilities. Specifically, we show that decreased migration costs or increased legalization probabilities will increase relationship hazard rates (dissolution) for both daters and cohabitators. These changes will also decrease utility for an identifiable segment of the relationship quality distribution.     

Challenging the de‐industrialization thesis: gender and indigenous textile production in Java under Dutch colonial rule,c. 1830–1920

Many dependency theorists as well as economic historians have contended that nineteenth‐century imperial policies and economic globalization de‐industrialized the global ‘periphery’. European metropoles extracted raw materials and tropical commodities from their overseas territories, and in turn indigenous consumers bought their industrial products, textiles in particular. This article investigates three of the assumptions of Ricardian trade theory that are often behind the de‐industrialization narrative. In this article it is argued that, at least for colonial Java's textile industry, these assumptions should be reconsidered. Adverse trade policies imposed by the Dutch and a prolonged terms‐of‐trade boom in favour of primary commodities make colonial Java a unique case for exploring the merits of the de‐industrialization thesis. Here it is demonstrated that Javanese households resourcefully responded to changing market circumstances, in the first place by flexible allocation of female labour. Moreover, indigenous textile producers specialized in certain niches that catered for local demand. Because of these factors, local textile production in Java appears to have been much more resilient than most of the historical literature suggests. These findings not only shed new light on the social and economic history of colonial Indonesia, but also contribute to the recent literature on alternative, labour‐intensive paths of industrialization in the non‐western world.     

Agricultural productivity and rural incomes in England and the Yangtze Delta,c.1620–c.18201

The productivity of agriculture in England and the Yangtze Delta are compared c.1620 and c.1820 in order to gauge the performance of the most advanced part of China vis‐à‐vis its counterpart in Europe. The value of real output is compared using purchasing power parity exchange rates. Output per hectare was nine times greater in the Yangtze Delta than in England. More surprisingly, output per day worked was about 90 per cent of the English performance. This put Yangtze farmers slightly behind English and Dutch farmers c.1820, but ahead of most other farmers in Europe—an impressive achievement. There was little change in Yangtze agricultural productivity between 1620 and 1820. In 1820, the real income of a Yangtze peasant family was also about the same as that of an English agricultural labourer. All was not rosy in the Yangtze, however, for incomes there were on a downward trajectory. Agriculture income per family declined between 1620 and 1820, even though income per day worked changed little since population growth led to smaller farms and fewer days worked per year. The real earnings of women in textile production also declined, since the relative price of cotton cloth dropped—possibly also because a larger population led to greater production. The implication is that the Yangtze family, unlike the English family, had a considerably higher real income c.1620, and that period was the Delta's golden age.     

Marriage seasonality and the industrious revolution: southern Sweden, 1690–18951

In this article we study the evolution of marriage seasonality in relation to economic change, particularly connected to changes in labour supply and work intensity of the kind implied by the ‘industrious revolution’. The focus is on southern Sweden in 1685–1894, which was a period of agricultural transformation and early industrialization, when we would expect to see an increase in work intensity. The analysis is based on about 120,000 marriages from 117 different parishes. The analysis shows that the seasonality of marriage changed dramatically over time, from a classic grain production pattern, with a marriage peak in late spring and a marriage trough at harvest time, to a much more even seasonality, although with the appearance of a very strong peak in December. This change affected rural rather than urban areas, and was present regardless of differences in institutional settings, and for almost all occupational groups below the elite. The changed seasonality pattern is consistent with increasing work intensity over the year, leaving only the weeks around Christmas as a low season. In addition to the increase in work intensity, the privatization of marriage and the availability of time and resources were also important factors in the changing seasonality pattern.     

Rural Europe reshaped: the economic transformation of upland regions, 1850–20001

Agriculture is no longer the main sector in the economy of rural Europe. Based on a comparative analysis of nine upland areas from five different countries (Scotland, Switzerland, France, Italy, and Spain), this article argues that, contrary to the claims of most social science work on ‘rural restructuring’, the decline of agriculture in the rural economy should be understood from a long‐term perspective and in relation to European industrialization, rather than as a recent process linked to postmodern dynamics. In fact, widely diverging paths of rural change during industrialization similarly imply occupational change.