This paper introduces and describes a new city-level data set on political institutions in pre-modern Europe. To be precise, it presents three variables reporting the prevalence of the different existing types of participative political institutions between 800 AD and 1800 AD in 104 cities in...

The French academic landscape has been increasingly confronted with contentious debates surrounding the concept of "Islamo-leftism" and the potential influence of foreign states in higher education and research institutions. This paper intends to provide a snapshot introduction to these issues,...

The development of pre-industrial Europe was driven by the expansion of trade. This paper describes the patterns of trade and shows how they can be understood in terms of differences in trading costs. It discusses how the different levels of trade?from local to transoceanic-contributed, both...

In pre-industrial Europe, growth was driven by the expansion of trade, and the expansion of trade was driven by falling trading costs. This paper discusses the mechanisms linking these processes: profit-seeking behavior by merchants, changes in the organization of production, technological...

State building and state competition during the 16th century triggered a creative moment in the history of public finance. Recent scholarship has clearly identified the Papal States and their communities as active participants both in the state building process and the reorganization of public...

Government had an enormous impact on economic growth and development in pre-industrial Europe. Mostly, this was unintended - a side effect, for example, of government exaction or of the waging of war. However, governments did also intervene in their economies deliberately. These interventions...

Renovatio Monetae, myntförnyelse, är ett latinskt uttryck som syftar på periodiska myntindragningar där gamla mynt förklarades ogiltiga och ersattes med nya. Myntindragningarna gav viktiga intäkter för den medeltida myntherren och de kunde ske så ofta som varje halvår. Vid dessa...

Greece is one of the countries that were dramatically affected by the recent euro crisis, as in six years it lost more than one fourth of its national product. Although its economic and monetary history is rich in crises and defaults, it has not been systematically studied, thus remaining...

This paper studies the operation of trans-Atlantic passenger shipping cartels during the period 1899-1911 and its effects on passenger traffic. We systematically document and categorize cartel agreements on the basis of key aspects of internal organization. Then, we exploit the variation in...