Archaic Institutions

Eric L. Jones
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Eric L. Jones: University of Buckingham

Chapter Chapter 7 in Barriers to Growth, 2020, pp 53-66 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Major examples of slowly changing institutions were communal farming and urban guilds, both of which meant economic underperformance. They represented a ‘survival of the mediocre’ and worked against maximising output. Their underlying goals were income equality and in the case of agriculture sustaining resources. Individuals could frustrate change—the ‘tragedy of the anti-commons’—delaying the extension of the market. Agriculture gradually changed from within; Parliamentary enclosure is typically overemphasised. Guilds succumbed to individual enterprise, besides the rise of rural manufacturing and the shift of industry to poorly regulated northern towns, but the process was also slow.

Keywords: Income equality; Survival of the mediocre; Changes within agriculture; Decay of guilds; Individual enterprise; Rural manufacturing; South–North shift of industry (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palscp:978-3-030-44274-3_7

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-44274-3_7

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