Economics Research Community Seminar – Stephen Broadberry

Title: Innovation and the Great Divergence
Guest Speaker: Stephen Broadberry is a Professorial fellow and a Professor of Economic History, Oxford University. He is also a Research Theme Leader at CAGE, University of Warwick and Director of the Economic History Programme at CEPR. He has also taught at the London School of Economics and the Universities of Warwick and Cardiff and held visiting positions at University of British Columbia, University of California, Berkeley, Humboldt University, Berlin, UPF Barcelona and Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo.

Date: 16 November 2022
Time: 13:00-14:00
Location: FDC.1.17

If you would like to attend, please register using the following link: https://forms.office.com/r/0gHNUa1UQ0.

Abstract

The Great Divergence of GDP per capita between the leading regions of Europe and China occurred around 1700 as a period of positive growth in Britain and the Netherlands coincided with a period of negative growth in the Yangzi Delta. The positive trend in northwest Europe was a continuation of a process that began in the fourteenth century, while the negative trend in the Yangzi Delta continued a pattern of alternating periods of growing and shrinking, but reaching lower levels of income. Total Factor Productivity growth was strongly positive in Britain after the Black Death, in the Netherlands during the Dutch Golden Age and again in Britain from the mid-seventeenth century. Although TFP growth was positive in China during the Northern Song dynasty, it was predominantly negative during the Ming and Qing dynasties.