Further Medieval Economic Divergence: Technology Adoption in a Predominantly Agricultural World

Bas van Leeuwen, Dmitry Didenko, Matteo Calabrese () and Meimei Wang ()
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Matteo Calabrese: Bocconi University
Meimei Wang: Institute of Economics

Chapter Chapter 3 in Innovation and Economic Development in Eurasia, 500 BCE-Present, 2025, pp 41-60 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract In this chapter, we move on from the relative stability of the period between the ancient world and the medieval and early modern world. As Chap. 2 indicates, even though this period witnessed several factors that caused both positive and negative growth in income per capita, none of these led to sustained economic growth (the Malthusian pattern dominated). Yet there are many factors that could enhance the unsustainable growth shocks. Initially, an important role was played mostly by agriculture, although this did not lead to sustained growth. We examine in this chapter how technological inventions emerged and how they were implemented. This relates to, for example, cheaper capital and a higher demand for labour-saving technologies in Western Europe than in China. Even though pressure for labour-saving technologies was therefore clearly higher in England, the economic sectors in which technological change occurred prior to 1900, water control, planting methods, draught animals, seed selection, and human capital, were of roughly equal importance in China and England.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-97043-6_3

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