Democracy, Institutions, and Differential Paths of Economic Growth Among New World Economies: From Settlement to 1940

肯尼斯·L·索科洛夫斯坦利·L·恩格曼斯蒂芬·H·哈伯国家经济研究局SBR-9515222这项研究将研究自欧洲人定居以来，政治经济学、经济制度和增长之间的关系是如何演变的，并在新世界的经济体中表现出来。对西欧和某些海外分支的现代扩张或经济增长的研究认为，政治民主和经济增长往往是同时出现的。这项研究将试图确定这在北美和南美是否属实。北美和南美洲的经济遵循着截然不同的经济和政治发展道路，尽管它们在人均自然资源方面都享有非常有利的环境，都是由相同的一小部分国家建立的，居住着来自相同经济阶层、相同人口的个人。尽管在定居时有这些相似之处，但在其社会中的政治权力、人力资本和财富的不平等程度、其经济机构的性质和结构以及实现增长方面，它们变得非常不同。新世界经济体为研究民主、制度和增长提供了一个有吸引力的天然实验室的另一个原因是，它们经历了政治制度的一些重大变化，比如实现了独立，伴随着经济制度的变化(或未能改变)。这项研究还将通过严格运用各经济体之间的比较方法，详细审查这类事件引起的机构变化的影响，以增进对机构在经济增长中的作用的理解。

Kenneth L. Sokoloff Stanley L. Engerman Stephen H. Haber National Bureau of Economic Research SBR-9515222 The research will study how the relationships between political economy, economic institutions, and growth evolved and were manifested among the economies of the New World since settlement by the Europeans. Studies of modern expansion or economic growth in western Europe and certain overseas offshoots have argued that political democracy and economic growth tended to emerge together. This research will attempt to determine if this is true in North and South America. The economies of North and South America followed very different paths of economic and political development even though all enjoyed extraordinarily favorable environments with respect to natural resources per person, were established by the same small set of countries and were peopled by individuals from the same economic classes of the same populations. Despite these similarities at the time of settlement, they came to differ enormously with respect to the degree of inequality in political power, human capital, and wealth within their societies, the nature and structure of their economic institutions, as well as their realization of growth. Another reason why New World economies provide an attractive natural laboratory for the study of democracy, institutions and growth, is that they experienced a number of major alterations in political regime, like the achievement of independence, with associated changes (or failures to change) in economic institutions. This research will also examine in detail the impacts of changes in institutions due to such events, with a rigorous application of the comparative approach across economies, to improve the understanding of the role of institutions in economic growth.