Boerner, Lars and Ritschl, Albrecht 
ORCID: 0000-0003-0856-9704
(2008)
The economic history of sovereignty: communal responsibility, the extended family, and the firm.
Economic History Working Papers (110/08).
Department of Economic History, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK.
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Abstract
Economic institutions encompassing increasingly sophisticated concepts of risk-sharing and liability flourished in Europe since the High Middle Ages. These innovations occurred in an environment of fragmented local jurisdictions, not within the framework of the territorial state. In this short paper we attempt to sketch a unifying approach towards the interpretation of the emergence of these institutions. We argue that communal responsibility in medieval city states created incentives for excessive risk-taking by individual merchants, and that the emergence of firms mitigated this problem. We also find that entity shielding in the sense of Hansmann et al. (2006) arose endogenously and is not primarily the result of regulation by local authorities.
| Item Type: | Monograph (Working Paper) |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | http://www2.lse.ac.uk/economicHistory/workingPaper... |
| Additional Information: | © 2008 Lars Boerner & Albrecht Ritschl |
| Divisions: | Economic History |
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races D History General and Old World > D History (General) > D111 Medieval History |
| Date Deposited: | 29 Jan 2009 18:32 |
| Last Modified: | 11 Dec 2024 18:52 |
| URI: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/22307 |
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