The Castilian and Iberian crises as the cause for the European General Crisis of the 17th century: Commercial and Monetary perspectives (1575-1700).

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The aim of this project is to conduct a quantitative and qualitative study of the economic factors linking the Castilian commercial crisis (starting in 1575-1576) and the European crisis of the Seventeenth century. The project argues that the first is the cause of the latter - which is indeed an economy-based crisis - . The hypothesis proposes that the recession in Castile had commercial roots and that the crisis was one major cause of the European long depression in the 17th century. Moreover, this general crisis in Europe had, indeed, economic foundations. De Vries thesis on non-Malthusian, non-cyclical and global crisis points to that direction. Acemoglu et al. also consider the beginning of the crisis as economic. However, it is still present the Annals School's argument of Malthusian, only-Mediterranean decline.The general interpretation of Castile's economy in the early-modern world is of that a Malthusian, feudal and expansive agrarian economy. Then, extractive and predatory institutions caused its poor long-run performance. Likewise, scholars usually understand the European crisis in the 17th century as political, institutional and socially-based. However, Castilian high dependency on commerce and American bullion points to the other direction. The profound monetary shocks and commercial and economic changes experienced in Europe (e.g. displacement of the economic centre to the Atlantic North) also claims otherwise. Therefore, the project proposes a positive revisionism of the European and Spanish historiography and the relationships existent between 'semi-peripheries' and the 'core' economies. Then, the methodological steps undertaken are destined to end the contradictory situation. These steps are several. First, the identification of the monetary causes of the Castilian crisis, as well as its consequences in the European side. Second, the quantification of the degree of the economic crisis of the 17th century in Europe (through different variables). Third, the definition of the commercial linkages between the first and the second crises. In order to do so, it is essential the construction of time series on several commercial variables. Those include: commercial exchanges, monetary accounts (shocks and stocks), European flows of silver bullion and coinage, manufactures competitiveness and trade balances of payments of the major European countries.