Tells the story of how a small group of libertarian entrepreneurs began in the 1990s to hijack the original decentralized vision of the Internet, in the process creating three monopoly firms-Facebook, Amazon and Google-that now determine the future of the music, film, television, publishing and...

In the 1960s and 1970s, oil supplies were a source of international political conflict. Major oil companies, such as Exxon, Shell, and BP were key actors in this conflict. With their vertical, multinational structures, they dominated production and trade. The study examines their strategies and...

This paper exploits the introduction of the first regularized patent system, which appeared in the Venetian Republic in 1474, to examine the factors shaping inventors’ propensity to use a new form of intellectual property. We combine detailed information on craft guilds and patents in...