ECON 394
European Economic History Fall 2023
Division II
This is not the current course catalog

Economic history directly informs our understanding of the processes of economic development. With this in mind, this course will explore a series of questions related to the economic development of Europe from the pre-modern period until today. What was economic life like in the Roman Empire and Medieval Europe? Why did modern economic growth first occur in Europe, and not in China or the Middle East? Why did the Industrial Revolution occur in Britain and not France? What was the role of colonialism in the acceleration of European growth? What explains the rise and fall of the Soviet economy? What are the causes and consequences of European economic integration since World War II?To answer these and other questions, we will investigate how institutional changes, the evolution of technology, aspects of globalization, and various forms of government intervention have impacted economic growth and living standards in European history, and how those developments have affected the rest of the world. Drawing on a wide variety of empirical and theoretical readings, the course will focus on how economic historians marshal evidence and construct arguments in ways that borrow from and contribute to other fields of economics.