Mokyr, Joel (Author)
Why Enlightenment culture sparked the Industrial RevolutionDuring the late eighteenth century, innovations in Europe triggered the Industrial Revolution and the sustained economic progress that spread across the globe. While much has been made of the details of the Industrial Revolution, what remains a mystery is why it took place at all. Why did this revolution begin in the West and not elsewhere, and why did it continue, leading to today's unprecedented prosperity? In this groundbreaking book, celebrated economic historian Joel Mokyr argues that a culture of growth specific to early modern Europe and the European Enlightenment laid the foundations for the scientific advances and pioneering inventions that would instigate explosive technological and economic development. Bringing together economics, the history of science and technology, and models of cultural evolution, Mokyr demonstrates that culture―the beliefs, values, and preferences in society that are capable of changing behavior―was a deciding factor in societal transformations.Mokyr looks at the period 1500–1700 to show that a politically fragmented Europe fostered a competitive "market for ideas" and a willingness to investigate the secrets of nature. At the same time, a transnational community of brilliant thinkers known as the “Republic of Letters” freely circulated and distributed ideas and writings. This political fragmentation and the supportive intellectual environment explain how the Industrial Revolution happened in Europe but not China, despite similar levels of technology and intellectual activity. In Europe, heterodox and creative thinkers could find sanctuary in other countries and spread their thinking across borders. In contrast, China’s version of the Enlightenment remained controlled by the ruling elite.Combining ideas from economics and cultural evolution, A Culture of Growth provides startling reasons for why the foundations of our modern economy were laid in the mere two centuries between Columbus and Newton.
...MoreReview Simon Ville (Summer 2017) Review of "A Culture of Growth: The Origins of the Modern Economy". Business History Review (pp. 389-391).
Book
Schabas, Margaret;
Marchi, Neil de;
(2003)
Oeconomies in the Age of Newton
(/isis/citation/CBB000750939/)
Article
Pincus, Steve;
(2012)
Rethinking Mercantilism: Political Economy, the British Empire, and the Atlantic World in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
(/isis/citation/CBB001212881/)
Thesis
Alexander Lee Arnold;
(2017)
Rethinking Economics in Modern France
(/isis/citation/CBB135548088/)
Book
Nathaniel Wolloch;
(2016)
Nature in the History of Economic Thought: How Natural Resources Became an Economic Concept
(/isis/citation/CBB540959036/)
Article
M. Day;
(2016)
Restoration Commerce and the Instruments of Trust: Robert Boyle and the Science of Money
(/isis/citation/CBB962722536/)
Book
Richard P. Saller;
(2022)
Pliny's Roman economy: natural history, innovation, and growth
(/isis/citation/CBB389443776/)
Book
Charles R. Cobb;
(2019)
The Archaeology of Southeastern Native American Landscapes of the Colonial Era
(/isis/citation/CBB092618232/)
Book
Adrian Green;
Barbara Crosbie;
(2018)
Economy and Culture in North-East England, 1500–1800
(/isis/citation/CBB339378272/)
Book
Steven L. Kaplan;
(2015)
The Stakes of Regulation: Perspectives on 'Bread, Politics and Political Economy' Forty Years Later
(/isis/citation/CBB042761373/)
Book
Philip J. Stern;
Carl Wennerlind;
(2016)
Mercantilism Reimagined: Political Economy in Early Modern Britain and Its Empire
(/isis/citation/CBB904667767/)
Book
Pestre, Dominique;
Roqué, Xavier;
(2008)
Ciència, diners i política. Assaig d'interpretació
(/isis/citation/CBB001032065/)
Article
Ferguson, Dean T.;
(2014)
Nightsoil and the “Great Divergence”: Human Waste, the Urban Economy, and Economic Productivity, 1500--1900
(/isis/citation/CBB001421528/)
Book
Milgate, Murray;
Stimson, Shannon C.;
(2009)
After Adam Smith: A Century of Transformation in Politics and Political Economy
(/isis/citation/CBB001451812/)
Article
Graham Clure;
(2015)
Rousseau, Diderot and the Spirit of Catherine the Great's Reforms
(/isis/citation/CBB017216149/)
Article
Daniel Luban;
(2015)
Bernard Mandeville as Moralist and Materialist
(/isis/citation/CBB892524347/)
Book
Jeffrey Sklansky;
(2017)
Sovereign of the Market: The Money Question in Early America
(/isis/citation/CBB762518399/)
Book
Brian Phillips Murphy;
(2015)
Building the Empire State: Political Economy in the Early Republic
(/isis/citation/CBB610727332/)
Chapter
Riskin, Jessica;
(2003)
The “Spirit of System” and the Fortunes of Physiocracy
(/isis/citation/CBB000501261/)
Chapter
Maas, Harro;
(2010)
Sorting Things Out: The Economist as an Armchair Observer
(/isis/citation/CBB001221454/)
Article
Phil Withington;
(2020)
Intoxicants and the invention of ‘consumption’
(/isis/citation/CBB559161634/)
Be the first to comment!