Detailed course schedule

The course takes places during the 12 weeks of the Fall Semester. After the 3^rd week, the course is divided into a lecture (1.5h/week) and a paper seminar part (1.5h/week). The course will follow the following schedule:

Week #1: Overview of the course

ü Introduction, outline of the course and course requirements

ü Short presentation of research papers for paper assignments

ü Allocation procedure of paper assignments

Week #2: (Non-technical) Introduction to quantitative methods in economic history

ü Allocation of research paper assignments

ü Quantitative methods in economic history: DiD, IV, (fuzzy) RDD, SCM

Week #3: From the Stone Age to early development

ü Growth since the year AD 1: From stagnation to the “sustainable” economic growth

ü The Malthusian poverty trap

ü The four horsemen of riches

ü The emergence of the European Marriage Pattern (EMP) and the fertility transition

Paper Seminar on “Stone Age economics”:

(A1) Matranga, A. (2019): “The Ant and the Grasshopper: Seasonality and the Invention of Agriculture”, Working Paper Chapman University. (Level: medium)

(A2) Izdebski, A., Słoczyński, T., Bonnier, A., Koloch, G., and K. Kouli (2020): “Landscape Change and Trade in Ancient Greece: Evidence from Pollen Data”, The Economic Journal (forthcoming). (Level: easy)

(A3) Barjamovic, G., Chaney, T., Coşar, K., and A. Hortaçsu (2019): “Trade, Merchants, and the Lost Cities of the Bronze Age”, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 134 (3), 1455–1503. (Level: difficult)

Week #4: The Industrial Revolution

ü Theories on the Industrial Revolution: “Enlightenment” versus relative factor prices

ü The spread of the industrial revolution: The cases of Germany, France and Russia

Paper Seminar on early development before the IR:

(B1) Ogilvie, S. (2014): “The Economics of Guilds”, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(4), 169–192. (Level: easy)

(B2) Dittmar, J. E. (2011): “Information Technology and Economic Change: The Impact of the Printing Press”, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 126(3), 1133–1172. (Level: medium-difficult)

(B3) Derenoncourt, E. (2019): “Atlantic Slavery's Impact on European and British Economic Development”, Working Paper UC Berkeley. (Level: medium)

Week #5: Cultural Economics

ü Cultural economics: How social trust relates to economic prosperity – An example

ü Stylized facts about cultural differences in the European Union

ü The origin of cultural differences: Nature, economic conditions and institutions

Paper Seminar on the Industrial Revolution:

(C1) Markevich, A., and E. Zhuravskaya (2018): “The Economic Effects of the Abolition of Serfdom: Evidence from the Russian Empire”, American Economic Review, 108(4-5), 1074–1117. (Level: medium-difficult)

(C2) Heblich, S., and A. Trew (2019): “Banking and Industrialization”, Journal of the European Economic Association 17(6), 1753–1796. (Level: medium-difficult)

(C3) de Pleijt, A., Nuvolari, A., and J. Weisdorf (2020): “Human Capital Formation During the First Industrial Revolution: Evidence from the use of Steam Engines”, Journal of the European Economic Association, 18(2), 829–889. (Level: medium)

Week #6: The economics of wars and its consequences

ü Economic disintegration, coordination failure and the role of new borders

ü War debt, reparation and four big hyperinflations in CEE and Germany

ü The end of hyperinflations: Fundamentals versus expectations

Paper Seminar on the shadow of wars:

(D1) Juhász, R. (2018): “Temporary Protection and Technology Adoption: Evidence from the Napoleonic Blockade”, American Economic Review, 108(11), 3339–3376. (Level: medium-difficult)

(D2) Correia, S., Luck, S., and E. Verner (2020): “Pandemics Depress the Economy, Public Health Interventions Do Not: Evidence from the 1918 Flu”, Working Paper MIT. (Level: medium)

(D3) Becker, S. O., Boeckh, K., Hainz, C., and L. Woessmann (2016): “The Empire Is Dead, Long Live the Empire! Long-Run Persistence of Trust and Corruption in the Bureaucracy”, Economic Journal 126(590), 40–74. (Level: medium)

Week #7: The Great Depression in the USA and Europe

ü The Great Depression in the USA: From the roaring twenties to the economic downturn

ü Recovery in the US: Fundamentals versus expectations

ü Europe: Similar but different

ü Golden fetters: The role of the Gold Standard for European recovery

Paper Seminar on the Great Depression:

(E1) Lee, J., and F. Mezzanotti (2017): “Bank Distress and Manufacturing: Evidence from the Great Depression”, Working Paper, Northwestern University. (Level: medium-difficult)

(E2) Hausman, J. K., Rhode, P. W., and J. F. Wieland (2019): “Recovery from the Great Depression: The Farm Channel in Spring 1933”, American Economic Review, 109(2), 427–472. (Level: medium-difficult)

(E3) Doerr, S., Gissler, S., Peydró, J.L., and H.-J. Voth (2020): “From Finance to Fascism, Working Paper”, University of Zurich. (Level: medium-difficult)

Week #8: The economics of totalitarian regimes – Nazi Germany and the USSR

ü Nazi Germany: “Keynesian” economic policy or other drivers of economic success

ü USSR: The great experiment

ü Partial success and failure of planning economies

Paper Seminar on totalitarian regimes:

(F1) Voigtländer, N., and H-J. Voth (2012): “Persecution Perpetuated: The Medieval Origins of Anti-Semitic Violence in Nazi Germany”, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 127, 1339–1392. (Level: medium)

(F2) Mohr, C. (2019): “Carrots and Sticks: Targeting the Opposition in an Autocratic Regime”, Working Paper, LMU Munich. (Level: medium-difficult)

(F3) Suesse, M. (2018): “Breaking the Unbreakable Union: Nationalism, Disintegration and the Soviet Economic Collapse”, The Economic Journal, 128 (615), 2933–2967. (Level: medium)

Week #9: Regional economics in post-WWII – Lessons from exogenous shocks

ü Liberation and occupation of Europe after WWII – Experimental settings for quantitative economic history

ü Regional economics: Nature versus man-made regional economic inequality

ü Examples: Liberation and occupation of Europe by the Allies, market access

ü Political economy: Political extremism

Paper Seminar on ethnic cleansing in CEE:

(G1) Testa, P. A. (2020), “The Economic Legacy of Expulsion: Lessons from Postwar Czechoslovakia”, The Economic Journal (forthcoming). (Level: medium)

(G2) Becker, S. O., Grosfeld, I., Grosjean, P., Voigtländer, N., and E. Zhuravskaya (2020): “Forced Migration and Human Capital: Evidence from post-WWII Population Transfers”, American Economic Review 110(5), 1430–1463. (Level: medium-difficult)

(G3) Grossmann, J., Jurajda, S., and F. Roesel (2020): “Forced Migration, Stayers, and New Societies: Evidence from Ethnic Cleansing in Czechoslovakia”, Working Paper/mimeo, Dresden/Prague. (Level: medium)

Week #10: Economic growth and bloc integration in the East and West

ü Economic miracle in the East and West

ü Bloc integration in the West: From EG-6 to the European Union

ü Bloc integration in the East: COMECON and the lack of price signals

Paper Seminar on post-WWII economic growth:

(H1) Ochsner, C. (2020): “Dismantled once, Diverged forever? A Quasi-natural Experiment of Red Army’s Misdeeds in post-WWII Europe”, ifo Working Paper No. 240 (revised). (Level: medium)

(H2) Bianchi, N., and M. Giorcelli (2018): “Reconstruction Aid, Public Infrastructure, and Economic Development: The Case of the Marshall Plan in Italy”, Working Paper, UCLA. (Level: medium-difficult)

(H3) Glitz, A., and E. Meyersson (2020): “Industrial Espionage and Productivity”, American Economic Review, 110 (4), 1055–1103. (Level: difficult)

Week #11: Monetary integration – From Bretton Woods to the Euro

ü Bretton Woods: From initial success to imbalances

ü European monetary integration: From partial failures to the Euro

ü The Euro in the long-run

Paper Seminar on the economic transition after 1990:

(I1) Abadie, A., Diamond, A., and J. Hainmueller (2015): “Comparative Politics and the Synthetic Control Method”, American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 4