IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/poleco/v79y2023ics0176268023000769.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

You reap what you know: Appropriability and the origin of European states

Author

Listed:
  • Huning, Thilo R.
  • Wahl, Fabian

Abstract

Geography provides some states with a higher level of soil quality than others, and in addition has allowed some historical states to appropriate agricultural output at lower costs. To test this empirically, we propose a new measure of appropriability: caloric observability. The idea behind this measure is that geography induces variation between states because their signals about agricultural output differ in precision. Caloric observability is robustly and significantly correlated with proxies of government success on three levels: Data on all European states 1300–1700, our new data set on the Holy Roman Empire 1150–1789, and a municipality-level data set of 1545 Duchy of Württemberg.

Suggested Citation

  • Huning, Thilo R. & Wahl, Fabian, 2023. "You reap what you know: Appropriability and the origin of European states," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:poleco:v:79:y:2023:i:c:s0176268023000769
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2023.102432
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0176268023000769
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2023.102432?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nathan Nunn & Nancy Qian, 2011. "The Potato's Contribution to Population and Urbanization: Evidence From A Historical Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(2), pages 593-650.
    2. Andersen, Thomas Barnebeck & Jensen, Peter Sandholt & Skovsgaard, Christian Volmar, 2016. "The heavy plow and the agricultural revolution in Medieval Europe," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 133-149.
    3. Davide Cantoni & Jeremiah Dittmar & Noam Yuchtman, 2018. "Religious Competition and Reallocation: the Political Economy of Secularization in the Protestant Reformation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 2037-2096.
    4. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2013. "On the Origins of Gender Roles: Women and the Plough," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 128(2), pages 469-530.
    5. Olsson, Ola & Hansson, Gustav, 2011. "Country size and the rule of law: Resuscitating Montesquieu," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 613-629, June.
    6. Ahmed, Ali T. & Stasavage, David, 2020. "Origins of Early Democracy," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 114(2), pages 502-518, May.
    7. Davide Cantoni, 2012. "Adopting a New Religion: the Case of Protestantism in 16th Century Germany," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(560), pages 502-531, May.
    8. Oded Galor & Ömer Özak, 2016. "The Agricultural Origins of Time Preference," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(10), pages 3064-3103, October.
    9. Nicholas Crafts, 2005. "Market potential in British regions, 1871-1931," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(9), pages 1159-1166.
    10. Allen,Robert C., 2009. "The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521868273.
    11. Nicola Gennaioli & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2015. "State Capacity and Military Conflict," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 82(4), pages 1409-1448.
    12. Mayshar, Joram & Moav, Omer & Neeman, Zvika, 2017. "Geography, Transparency, and Institutions," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 111(3), pages 622-636, August.
    13. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James A. Robinson, 2001. "The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1369-1401, December.
    14. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James Robinson, 2005. "The Rise of Europe: Atlantic Trade, Institutional Change, and Economic Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 546-579, June.
    15. Nathan Nunn & Diego Puga, 2012. "Ruggedness: The Blessing of Bad Geography in Africa," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(1), pages 20-36, February.
    16. Huning, Thilo R. & Wahl, Fabian, 2021. "The fetters of inheritance? Equal partition and regional economic development," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    17. Olsson, Ola & Hibbs, Douglas Jr., 2005. "Biogeography and long-run economic development," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 909-938, May.
    18. Oded Galor & Omer Ozak, 2015. "Land Productivity and Economic Development: Caloric Suitability vs. Agricultural Suitability," Working Papers 2015-5, Brown University, Department of Economics.
    19. repec:ecj:econjl:v:122:y:2012:i::p:502-531 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. North, Douglass C. & Thomas, Robert Paul, 1971. "The Rise and Fall of the Manorial System: A Theoretical Model," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 31(4), pages 777-803, December.
    21. Philip T. Hoffman, 2011. "Prices, the military revolution, and western Europe's comparative advantage in violence," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(s1), pages 39-59, February.
    22. Abramson, Scott F, 2017. "The Economic Origins of the Territorial State," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 71(1), pages 97-130, January.
    23. Karaman, K. Kivanç & Pamuk, Şevket, 2013. "Different Paths to the Modern State in Europe: The Interaction Between Warfare, Economic Structure, and Political Regime," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 107(3), pages 603-626, August.
    24. Joram Mayshar & Omer Moav & Luigi Pascali, 2022. "The Origin of the State: Land Productivity or Appropriability?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 130(4), pages 1091-1144.
    25. Cantoni, Davide & Mohr, Cathrin & Weigand, Matthias, 2019. "The Rise of Fiscal Capacity," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 172, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    26. James B. Ang, 2015. "What Drives the Historical Formation and Persistent Development of Territorial States?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 117(4), pages 1134-1175, October.
    27. Huning, Thilo R. & Wahl, Fabian, 2021. "The origins of agricultural inheritance traditions," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(3), pages 660-674.
    28. Olson, Mancur, 1993. "Dictatorship, Democracy, and Development," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(3), pages 567-576, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Davide Cantoni & Cathrin Mohr & Matthias Weigand, 2024. "The Rise of Fiscal Capacity: Administration and State Consolidation in the Holy Roman Empire," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 92(5), pages 1439-1472, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nunn, Nathan, 2014. "Historical Development," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 7, pages 347-402, Elsevier.
    2. Thilo R. Huning & Fabian Wahl, 2016. "You Reap What You Know: Observability of Soil Quality, and Political Fragmentation," Working Papers 0101, European Historical Economics Society (EHES).
    3. Ang, James B. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2018. "Agricultural yield and conflict," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 397-417.
    4. Ang, James B. & Madsen, Jakob B. & Wang, Wen, 2021. "Rice farming, culture and democracy," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    5. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde & Mark Koyama & Youhong Lin & Tuan-Hwee Sng, 2023. "The Fractured-Land Hypothesis," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 138(2), pages 1173-1231.
    6. Ying Bai & James Kai-sing Kung, 2022. "Surname distance and technology diffusion: the case of the adoption of maize in late imperial China," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 569-607, December.
    7. Alberto Bisin & Jared Rubin & Avner Seror & Thierry Verdier, 2024. "Culture, institutions and the long divergence," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 1-40, March.
    8. Fredriksson, Per G. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2022. "Land productivity and colonization," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    9. Bartels, Charlotte & Jäger, Simon & Obergruber, Natalie, 2020. "Long-Term Effects of Equal Sharing: Evidence from Inheritance Rules for Land," IZA Discussion Papers 13665, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Maseland, Robbert, 2021. "Contingent determinants," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    11. Andrew Dickens, 2022. "Understanding Ethnolinguistic Differences: The Roles of Geography and Trade," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 132(643), pages 953-980.
    12. James Fenske, 2014. "Ecology, Trade, And States In Pre-Colonial Africa," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 612-640, June.
    13. Boerner, Lars & Rubin, Jared & Severgnini, Battista, 2021. "A time to print, a time to reform," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    14. James Fenske, 2013. "Does Land Abundance Explain African Institutions?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 123(12), pages 1363-1390, December.
    15. Gutmann, Jerg & Voigt, Stefan, 2018. "The rule of law: Measurement and deep roots," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 68-82.
    16. Cantoni, Davide & Mohr, Cathrin & Weigand, Matthias, 2019. "The Rise of Fiscal Capacity," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 172, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    17. Thomas Keywood & Jörg Baten, 2021. "Elite violence and elite numeracy in Europe from 500 to 1900 CE: roots of the divergence," Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History, Association Française de Cliométrie (AFC), vol. 15(2), pages 319-389, May.
    18. Flückiger, Matthias & Ludwig, Markus, 2020. "Malaria suitability, urbanization and subnational development in sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    19. Carl-Johan Dalgaard & Anne Sofie B. Knudsen & Pablo Selaya, 2020. "The bounty of the sea and long-run development," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 259-295, September.
    20. Matthew Delventhal, 2019. "The Globe as a Network: Geography and the Origins of the World Income Distribution," 2019 Meeting Papers 840, Society for Economic Dynamics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Fiscal capacity; Soil heterogeneity; Holy Roman Empire; Duchy of Württemberg;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • N93 - Economic History - - Regional and Urban History - - - Europe: Pre-1913

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:poleco:v:79:y:2023:i:c:s0176268023000769. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505544 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.