The Spanish Empire and Its Legacy: Fiscal Re-distribution and PoliticalConflict in Colonial and Post-Colonial Spanish AmericaThe Spanish Empire and Its Legacy: Fiscal Re-distribution and Political Conflict in Colonial and Post-Colonial Spanish America

As part of an endeavour to explain the divergence in incomes per capita between North and South America new institutional economics (NIE) and economic history have attempted in recent years to realize the potential effort for illumination derivable from comparisons of the heritage of their colonial institutions. As developed by North and his school these accounts of the institutional differences in the Americas are the offspring of similar (and we believe equally flawed) accounts for the divergence between Britain and the mainland of Europe – the latter afflicted by institutions epitomized by their inefficiencies compared with an entirely superior set of Anglo-Saxon institutions which promoted and sustained Britain’s successful trajectory to the First Industrial Revolution.[...]