Economic history

See also: History of the economy, Amorce=Pour historical course of the economic activity, to see

The economic history is a speciality of the Histoire which studies the evolution of the economy. It counts the economic facts, orders them and an interpretation by means of the economic theories proposes of it.

Connect history and/or connects economy

The experts and lawyers of the first approach which was a long time the principal one, generally looked at the economic history as being a branch of the history, or perhaps a discipline with whole share. In France, it was like the historical Démographie looked like integral part of the history, translation of the domination of the historical school of the Annales since the Années 1930 and of Fernand Braudel after the Second world war. Today still the rare departments of economic history of the French universities belong to the UFR of history.

The followers of the second opinion which is dominant with the the United States and in rapid expansion in the world regards it as part of the economic discipline. In particular, as well as translated the new substantive of “Cliométrie” used to describe the increasing application of the techniques Statistical S and the econometrics in the searches of economic history.

The economic history was a long time a subject of confrontations in Great Britain between the London School off Economics (Them) and the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge. Those supported that the economy included an economic share of history and that the two disciplines could not be separate. More recently, a model proposed Them successfully in which the economic history was an autonomous discipline. Until the end of the years 1990, this model seemed to carry it with the erection of autonomous departments in many English and American universities. For some time, it seems that the movement is reversed and that the economic history joins the bosom of the economy.

In fact, if the two main subjects, economy and history remain single - joined together, they form the structure of the discipline. In the facts, one sees more and more historians of the saving in foreground like Nicholas Crafts (Them), Bob Fogel or Douglass North (two recent Nobel Prize of economy) to become the economic advisers of institutions like the the IMF, OECD or ILO.

Sources of the economic history

The sources of the economic history are multiple and close to those of the history in general:

  • the archaeological sources and the Numismatique are the independent sources for the old story

  • sources of historical demography, like the registers parochial, documents of Registry office, registers body of notaries, hospital… for the knowledge of the populations

  • compiled series of price, data of customs, movements of ships, production of the sites of manufacture… to constitute statistical series of all kinds

  • public or deprived documents, like the charters, treaties, laws, payments, agreements, contracts…

  • sources of banking and financial…

  • biographies and all sources written concerning the evolution of the social and political structures…

Methods of the economic history

As any branch of the history, the economic history resorts to all the traditional methods of the historian.

See also: historical Methodology

History of the economic facts

August 1st

Quantitative history

The penetration of the statistics and the econometric analysis progressed with the increasing possibilities offered by the data-processing exploitation. The compilation of data or construction of long statistical series, like those on the economic activity of the countries for thousand years created by Angus Maddison, researcher with OECD, has been increasingly systematic.

This evolution led until the theorization of this practice such as the term “Cliométrie reveals it” which refers to the systematic use of the economic theory and the econometric techniques to study the economic history. The substantive was created by two American researchers, Jonathan Hughes and Stanley Reiter in 1960 by referring to Clio, MUSE Greek of the history.

History of the economic ideas

See also: History of the economic thinking

Large currents of the economic history

The current of the Yearly

  • Fernand Braudel: material Civilization, economy and capitalism, XVe-XVIIIe century , 1967, rééd. 1979.
  • Emmanuel Roy Ladurie: Human history and compared climate since the year Millet , 1967, rééd. 2004.
  • Immanuel Wallerstein: the System of the world, the 15th century at our days , 1974, rééd. 1980.

Weberiens

Economists of the development

  • Karl Polanyi : the Great Transformation: political and economic origins of our time , 1944.
  • Joseph Schumpeter: Capitalism, socialism and democracy , 1942.
  • Alexander Gerschenkron: Economic Backwardness in Historical Prospect: In Book off Essays , 1962.
  • Ester Boserup: The Conditions off Agricultural Growth: The Economics off Agrarian Change under Population Presses , 1965.
  • Simon Kuznets: Modern Economic Growth: Misses, Structure and Spread , 1966.
  • Paul Bairoch: From Jericho to Mexico City. Cities and economy in the history , 1985.
  • Alfred Chandler: Visible The Hand: Managerial The Revolution in American Business , 1977.
  • Douglas North: Institutional Changes and American Economic Growth , 1971.

Marxist and marxiens

Quantitativists

  • Robert Fogel: Railroads and American Economic Growth: Essays in Econometric History , 1964.
  • Phyllis Deane and W.A. Cole: British Economic Growth, 1688-1959: Trends and Structure , 1967.
  • Angus Maddison: Worldwide economy: a thousand-year-old prospect , 2001.

The Monétaristes

  • Milton Friedman : has Monetary History off the United States, 1867-1960 , 1963.

Related disciplines

The two principal branches of the economic history are:
  • history of the economic facts
  • history of the ideas (or the thought) economic

But, one counts also many related disciplines:

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