Product Description

Politicized Economies illuminates the high tide of mercantilism in England and the entrenchment of controls in the French and Spanish economies between 1540 and 1640. Ekelund and Tollison subject mercantilist foreign trade to neoclassical-neoinstitutional analysis, examining the general economic organization of the mercantile companies and focusing on the economic inner workings of the East India Company. The authors probe for the origins of the modern corporation in the early joint stock companies of England and analyze the effects of regulatory forms on the business organizations that emerged to engage in foreign trade.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1608089 in Books
• Published on: 1997-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 300 pages

Customer Reviews

Swedish economic historians are morons
Most economic historians still believe that "history happens." This is most obvious in contemporary Swedish writings on mercantilism. Axelaxe must not have read this book -- it offers evidence (which real economic historians use) that mercantile states WERE rent-seeking societies. Perhaps the success of this idea is what upsets Axelaxe!

Economic history at its worst
If you really want to show historians how useless economic history is, write a book like this one. To Ekelund and Tollison, the mercantile era is the rent seeking model, and nothing more. If you get the model, you get 200 years of history in a graph. If you are unconvinced, you must be a moron, according to these gentlemen. Ignorance about history is a virtue, one suspects.