Poli 220 Bates and Lien Flashcards

• Which states deliver economic variation

  unlimited (dictatorships)
• Which sole combo delivers a limited state

  dependence and credible exit options
• Why the French monarchy did not accept limits on its predatory behaviour

  they depended on elites without credible exit threats (fixed assets)
• Why did the English monarchy accept limits on its predatory behaviour

  They depended on elites with credible exit threats (i.e. Mobile assets)
• How did the French crown differ in their response to the EVL game

  -French Crown was dependent on Parliament for revenue, L >1.

  -But Parliamentarians did not have mobile assets, E <0.
• Why does the English crown respond to voice in the EVL game

  -English Crown was dependent on Parliament for revenue, L >1.

  -Parliamentarians had mobile assets, E >0.
• EVL: The Crown has confiscated the assets of a segment of the elite represented by Parliament, what are the three options of the parliamentarians


  1. EXIT

  -Disinvest from the economy

  2. VOICE

  -Petition the Crown for protection against future confiscations in exchange for a promise to continue investing in the economy

  3. LOYAL

  -Keep investing and paying taxes
• how did a more limited state happen in England before France

  Accomplished by the unique structure of the economy that early modernization produced in England
• The introduction of a more limited state occurred earlier and more definitively than it did in France

  true
• Credible Commitment in the English case

  Gentry could use their control of Commons and Lords to protect their interests from the Crown
• Credible Commitment solution

  A strong parliaments solves the credible commitment problems by keeping power in the hands of the recipient of the promise
• Stronger Parliament benefit?

  Credible commitment problem solution
• Result of hiding assets

  Supremacy of Parliament over the Crown
• How did the English gentry hiding assets force the change

  -The Crown had to negotiate with the new economic elites in order to extract revenue

  -In return for paying their taxes, the economic elites demanded limits to state predation.
• How did the balance of power between modernizing social groups and the Crown shift

  through the ability of the English gentry to hide their assets
• Key point of France vs. England in taxing

  State can tax/prey only on assets that it can observe and count
• Taxing in France

  Tax base rests on fixed-field agriculture and salt

  -But the King mandates all French inhabitants to buy a certain amount of salt which was taxed (la gabelle)
• Taxing in England

  Tax base rests on (textile) trade

  -Gentry become capitalist (sheep-/wool) farmers linked to Low Countries' textile market via middle-men in towns
• Classical modernization theory in England

  Structural changes in the economy produced a shift in economic power away from traditional agricultural elites who controlled easily observable assets to a rising capitalist-merchant class who controlled assets that were more difficult to observe.
• B&L argument of classical modernization theory in England


  these changes in early modern Europe played a crucial role in the creation of representative government in England
• Bates and Lien view the state as....

  predatory
• It is not income that directly encourages democratization


  changes in the socioeconomic structure that accompany wealth in the modernization process
• Why does English economy take off while French stagnates?

  Something about England's economic structure made it takeoff

  - Not about GDP per capita

  -Its about how it is generated
• Basic text offers...

  a related story about the causal mechanism linking economic development and democracy