Since the economic reforms of the 1990s, India's economy has grown rapidly. To sustain growth and foreign investment over the long run requires a well-developed legal infrastructure for conducting business, including cheap and reliable contract enforcement and secure property rights. But it's...

Contemporary historians usually attribute the East India Company's military success in India to its military strength, and to the mutual distrust of Indian regimes. We argue these explanations, though correct, are incomplete. The credibility of the Company's commitments, even though imperfect,...

The East India Company's conquest of India was facilitated by the behavior of its Indian rivals who not only did not ally against it, but often supported it militarily. Historians have typically attributed this to myopia, the failure to understand the long-term threat represented by the Company....