They have set out an alternative theory in a number of books and papers, the best known being Acemoglu and Robinson’s Why Nations Fail. This argues that what makes the difference between success and failure are political and economic institutions. Nations succeed if they have clearly enforceable property rights and the rule of law, sustained by pluralism and accountable government. They allow innovation and challenge to existing economic power by new entrants and the forces of “creative democracy”. These nations are dubbed “inclusive”.
Well, sort of, yes. But that these institutions are *only* economic or political is to miss a good deal of the point. They’re also social and cultural.
The nuclear and extended family models for example. There are those – no, really – who insist this is a part of it. With hte nuclear family it’s possible to get ahead, save, invest. With hte extended any good fortune gets expended upon taking care of previously unknown third cousins – as anyone in West Africa how that works. Or primogeniture rather than real property (really, meaning land) gets equally divided among all children. There’s a reason the Catholic Irish were all trying to feed a family on 1/2 an acre of potatoes in 1840. Because the Protestant English had been insisting for centuries that the Irish Catholics must follow that divide among all inheritance pattern.
The Fink’s mistake is to think it’s all political and economic – and thus is something that is decided by good policy at the centre. That slots nicely into his worldview, that everything is decided at that centre where the just and righteous plan the world for all. And no, just no. Yes, yes, institutions make the difference but it’s not just – note not just, not only – the planned institutions that matter. Some of it really is just happenstance.
This is just Gramscite revsionism
A state falls when the bureaucracy takes over. It us the same with companies. The institution effectively forgets why it is there and starts to exist solely for the purpose of existing.
A lot of German industry has gone this way ( I could see this complacency way back in the 1990s ).
The British state prior to 1914 was tiny. War, economic muddle and rigid ideoogy led us inexorably to the Welfare State and the growth of government involvement in every aspect of our lives. This is what is going to destroy the USA and EU and has already wrecked Canada.
You need an environment that fosters the right values and practices. Then the population will do the rest. The role of government and institutions in the sense he means it is to ensure the formula isn’t corrupted over the years by idiots who know better. Which is precisely what we’ve got, because that is the kind of people who take over governments and institutions.
“allow innovation and challenge to existing economic power by new entrants”
I like that part.
So this innovation of using local gas from the shales below us, or building several stories upwards, or Uber, or copying the health systems of neighbouring countries, let’s allow them.
Nations succeeded because of their climate, or because they were home to animals that were easy to domesticate, or because their religions encouraged hard work.
Three economists — Daron Acemoglu, James Robinson and Simon Johnson — have set about showing why these explanations are wrong.
A German zone filled with Germans will always be highly productive, even if you lump them with communism.
A German zone filled with black people and Arabs will be much like anywhere else filled with Arabs and blacks.
Where’s my book deal?
Measures to encourage diversity and protect workers are often “inclusive”, not “extractive”.
Fact check: Five Pinocchios.
There are no free lunches, so Diversity is at the expense of white people. If that was not the case, you wouldn’t need to “encourage” it through unequal treatment and menaces.
Sowell makes convincing points about geographical isolation and disadvantage (escarpments near coasts; impossibility of navigating rivers past these to get inland; rainfall seasonality that renders rivers unnavigable for large parts of the year; rainforests; etc.) that are particularly characteristic of Africa.
He also points out that societies advance when their ‘cultural universes’ are expanded by interaction with outsiders. This requires travel, which generally requires trade. Travel was facilitated within the Eurasian landmass because it stretches East-West and remain in a similar climate zone. This is not possible to the same degree in Africa or the Americas, where travel from one end to the other requires traversing very different climate zones and also requires pack animals, absent from the Americas and Sub-Saharan Africa until Europeans took them there.
All of this explains why most of the significant advances in human society originated in China, India and Europe. What made Europe unique is that it developed democratic ideas early on (and thus the sense of individual self) and that conditions emerged (Protestantism) that challenged and eventually overturned the default tribal/feudal structure of human society and enabled the development of the modern cultural, political, economic and societal structures to which Acemoglu and Robinson refer.
In my view the two theories complement each other. Otto is also right about bureaucracy, which saw off Confucian China as the world’s leading and most innovative culture.
Want to get ahead and develop in the world? Be a coconut. Post-colonial Africa lacks coconuts and the result is clear.
“There is a good deal of argument among academics about why some nations prosper and others fail. Among the most popular explanations of the divergence are geographical and cultural ones. Nations succeeded because of their climate, or because they were home to animals that were easy to domesticate, or because their religions encouraged hard work.
Three economists — Daron Acemoglu, James Robinson and Simon Johnson — have set about showing why these explanations are wrong.”
I’m guessing that Danny has drastically simplified what’s been said by these economists. You just have to look at the catholic/protestant split to see that it’s geographic – places where you couldn’t easily grow food went protestant. Which is also why they industrialised earlier and then got democracy.
“Some places (Korea, for instance) have been split in two more or less randomly, and yet there have been very different outcomes, despite the territories having the same geography and culture. ”
North Korea is a puppet state of China, which stems from its geography, that it borders China and Russia. And for many years it pursued a policy of playing off friendship with Russia vs China to see who would give it the most goodies. For a couple of decades after the Korean war, North Korea was about as wealthy as South Korea by following this policy. Then South Korea started to take off. And you can see the decline in North Korean GDP with the fall of the Soviet Union. In a nutshell, Russia didn’t care any longer, so China didn’t have to spend as much.
If China stopped intervening in NK, it would quickly become like SK. You’d get a revolution, the Kims and their friends dangling from lampposts, messy as hell, but after that, it would take off, in the same way that Eastern Europe did after the Russians stopped interfering.
“Measures to encourage diversity and protect workers are often “inclusive”, not “extractive”.”
Why do you need to tell Greed Pig Capitalists to hire the best person for the job, who will make them more money?
The reason it’s extractive is that what we actually do with diversity now is have government putting a thumb on the scale. Like you can’t discriminate against young women who might spend most of the next 3 years taking maternity leave.
“All of this explains why most of the significant advances in human society originated in China, India and Europe.” That’s changed since my days in primary school. We were told about Mesopotamia (Sumer, Babylon, Assyrians etc) and Egypt.
To omit West Asia from the list is distinctly odd.
Here’s something I didn’t learn until recently: apparently there was a long spell when Egypt was viewed by European scholars as being part of Asia rather than Africa. I can see their point. Maybe we should revert to that – it would annoy all the right people.
Your point is well made, Tim. However, institutions need protection and health-checks to prevent decay (eg what has happened to the institution of private property since 1688). Unfortunately, “The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk” (Hegel) — ie by the time we are conscious of the wisdom of our institutions, decline has set in…
PiP
A lot of that was down to the Romans, I guess, who made the distinction between the Egyptians and the Mauritanians.
The Carthaginians and the Mauri were Africans but the Egyptians were a separate racial group as were the Numibians and Ethiopians.
Maybe it helps if you were part of the Roman Empire.
“Discover the ‘One Civilization Theory,’ which posits that the vast majority of civilizational achievements stem from a single cultural lineage. ”
https://youtu.be/VYOZ9DyOjbQ?si=bGvRjbw7g0_rpHI1
Alexander the Great had *only nominally* “accountable government”. He was duly tried for accidentally killing a friend while drunk but acquitted. So that generalisation is no more than a generalisation.
As for pluralism, whatever he *thinks* that means: I should be interested to see a single shred of evidence.
I meant Nubians above. I was going to write Numidians ( who were Africans in the Roman sense too ) in relation to the Mauri and accidentally combined the two names.
There’s a reason the Catholic Irish were all trying to feed a family on 1/2 an acre of potatoes in 1840. Because the Protestant English had been insisting for centuries that the Irish Catholics must follow that divide among all inheritance pattern.
Seems a bit rich blaming it on the Proddies. Inheritance of land In Ireland by Catholics was by Brehon law which predated Norman law. So it certainly predates Henry falling out with Rome.
Prods insisted that this be maintained. You could switch of course. Become a Prod and have primogeniture. But only if you became a Prod. Same with Napoleon’s insistence. Break the power of the landed barons by breaking up the land holdings.
john77
Alexander was not tried for killing Cleitus (Kleitos) the Black. Rather, Cleitus was tried posthumously for treasonably insulting Alexander.
Nations succeed if they have clearly enforceable property rights and the rule of law, sustained by pluralism and accountable government.
Sure, sound argument.
These nations are dubbed “inclusive”.
Are they? Why? What an odd choice of word.
When I hear something like this being pushed, especially by ‘liberal’ globalist goons, I immediately think ‘inclusive’ = ‘enforced tolerance of violent low IQ (but cheap) peasants’.