This paper surveys trends in both international economic integration and inequality over the past 150 years, as well as the links between them. In doing so, it distinguishes between (a) the different dimensions of globalization; and (b) between-country and within-country inequality. Theory...

Does democracy encourage free trade? It depends. Broadening the franchise involves transferring power from non-elected elites to the wider population, most of whom will be workers. The Hecksher-Ohlin-Stolper-Samuelson logic says that democratization should lead to more liberal trade policies in...

This paper uses international survey data to document two stylized facts. First, risk aversion is associated with anti-trade attitudes. Second, this effect is smaller in countries with greater levels of government expenditure. The paper thus provides evidence for the microeconomic underpinnings...

This paper provides a summary of what is known about trends in international commodity market integration during the second half of the second millennium. The range of goods which have been traded between continents since the Voyages of Discovery has steadily increased over time, and there has...

There are two contrasting views of pre-19th century trade and globalization. First, there are the world history scholars like Andre Gunder Frank who attach globalization 'big bang' significance to the dates 1492 (Christopher Colombus stumbles on the Americas in search of spices) and 1498 (Vasco...

For two decades, the consensus explanation of the British Industrial Revolution has placed technological change and the supply side at center stage, affording little or no role for demand or overseas trade. Recently, alternative explanations have placed an emphasis on the importance of trade...

On average, the poor European periphery converged on the rich industrial core in the four or five decades prior to World War I. Some, like the three Scandinavian economies, used industrialization to achieve a spectacular convergence on the leaders, especially in real wages and living standards....

We examine the impact of the Great Depression on the share of votes for right-wing anti-system parties in elections in the 1920s and 1930s. We confirm the existence of a link between political extremism and economic hard times as captured by growth or contraction of the economy. What mattered...

The Great Depression of the 1930s and the Great Credit Crisis of the 2000s had similar causes but elicited strikingly different policy responses. It may still be too early to assess the effectiveness of current policy responses, but it is possible to analyze monetary and fiscal policies in the...