Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) Joyce Burnette Professor of Economics, Wabashi College Joel Mokyr tackles big historical questions.  His work as a whole tells the story of how Europe, and Britain in particular, became the location where modern economic growth first erupted.    We have already heard about … Continue reading Symposium: Defining a Model of Cultural Change

Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) Deirdre Nansen McCloskey Emerita, Economics and History, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago Joel wrote a characteristically brilliant, witty, learned, persuasive, humane, penetrating book. It is economics, for its steady attention to the most recent insights of economic theory; it is history, for … Continue reading Symposium: Getting It Almost Exactly Right; Mokyr’s Glittering Culture of Capitalism

Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) Jan de Vries Ehrman Professor Emeritus UC-Berkeley For many decades economic historians focused on honing their technical skills as economists in order to address fairly small historical questions. Recently, several leading figures have turned to big questions, those hitherto thought beyond the … Continue reading Symposium: Can economics explain cultural change?

Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) David Mitch Professor of Economics, Univ. of Maryland Joel Mokyr has produced a masterful collection of 17 essays on the relationship between early modern European intellectual life and subsequent European economic growth.  The book’s spotlight on the early modern period is something … Continue reading Symposium: Elites, Cultural Bias, and Ideas as Drivers of Economic Advance: Comments on A Culture of Growth

Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) Steve Pincus Thomas Donnelly Professor of History Univ. of Chicago Joel Mokyr’s Culture of Growth is a remarkable achievement.  Mokyr has produced a cultural account of the origins of the Industrial Revolution, the Great Divergence, or the Great Enrichment based on deep … Continue reading Symposium: Four Questions To Mokyr’s A Cultural of Growth

Originally published in Section Culture: Newsletter of the ASA Culture Section. Spring 2020, Vol 32. Issue 1 Book Symposium: A Culture of Growth (2018, Princeton) Joel Mokyr Professor of Economics Northwestern University It is almost intimidating to have four of the world’s most distinguished scholars — two economists, two historians — comment on one’s book, and describe it in such flattering terms. That there would be some … Continue reading Symposium: Culture, Useful Knowledge, and A Belief in Human Agency