Power and Plenty: Trade, War, and the World Economy in the Second Millennium (Princeton Economic History of the Western World) (Hardcover)

by Ronald Findlay (Author), Kevin H. O'Rourke (Author)
Key Phrases: military revolution, nominal freight rates, freight factors, United States, Western Europe, New World (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"... a splendidly ambitious new book ... for anyone wanting a better understanding of economic developments in the last millennium." -- The Economist

"Findlay and O'Rourke tell their tale exceptionally well and give lively attention to alternate possibilities." -- Eric Rauchway, The New Republic

Review
The excellent new book Power and Plenty explains why some countries are rich, and why others are not. [Recent books] all try to explain the biggest question of the modern world: why some [countries] are rich and other poor. Now, we have...Power and Plenty, a tome that combines the interpretive focus of the new school of explainers with the breadth and depth of the old narratives. They also put neoliberal economic theory to the historical test by asking what it would predict, and then contrasting those forecasts with history's actual path. Findlay and O'Rourke tell their tale exceptionally well.
(Eric Rauchway The New Republic )

[A] splendidly ambitious new book...an excellent reference book for anyone wanting a better understanding of economic developments in the last millennium.
(Economist )

Aiming at nothing less than documenting the history of world trade over the last 1,000 years, Power and Plenty...appears to be required reading...for the purposes of better understanding how the world works.
(Andrew Leonard Salon.com )

This new history of the last thousand years of world trade is remarkable in both its grand sweep and its scholarly depth. It pieces together the story of global commerce from the medieval spice traders and nomads of Central Asia to the discovery and incorporation of the New World, to the Industrial Revolution and the rise of Europe, and to the globalizing forces of the postwar world economy. One theme is the importance of the 'vast webs of interrelationships' between western Europe and other regions that, beginning in the medieval period, set the stage for modern economic growth. The other theme is the critical role of war in propelling economic change through upheaval and adaptation.
(G. John Ikenberry Foreign Affairs )

Power and Plenty is a wide-ranging survey, both of the facts and of the literature, not an essay organized around a single thesis. It takes on, and treats seriously, a ton of material. Bearing that in mind, it is...engaging...well written, spiced with nuggets of fascinating information and dry wit. [Findlay and O'Rourke's] economics is sophisticated and mainstream...but enriched with an unusual attention to noneconomic factors--or, as the authors put it, 'a sustained emphasis on conflict, violence and geopolitics.'
(Clive Crook Financial Times )

[A] solid new book. Power and Plenty is an ambitious endeavor that examines the works in the second millennium in light of globalization, deglobalization, reglobalization, and globalization as we know it today. The book fills a gap by scrutinizing the technological and political causes behind the long-term trends during the past thousand years. [The authors] have drawn exhaustively on the historical, political, and economic literature of the relevant periods for virtually all the major regions in the world.
(Wan Lixin Shanghai Daily )

This magisterial volume presents an analytical history of world trade from 1000 CE to the present, with informed speculation about future trends thrown in for good measure. It is a very considerable achievement, for which Findlay and O'Rourke deserve great praise.
(M. Veseth Choice )

In this magnificently conceived and executed work, Findlay and O'Rourke set out the history of global trade and show how it has been influenced by economic development and politics over the last thousand years. The authors have an important story to tell and they tell it superbly. This is a work brimming with scholarship, deftly combining narrative history with accessible economic analysis. This is a goldmine of a book. Open it where you will, there are nuggets to be extracted. It will remain the standard work on the history of world trade and indeed the development of the world economy for many years to come.
(Frank Geary Irish Times )

This magisterial volume presents an analytical history of world trade from 1000 CE to the present, with informed speculation about future trends thrown in for good measure. It is a very considerable achievement, for which Findlay and O'Rourke deserve great praise.
(M. Veseth Choice )

[T]he best book of its sort since David Landes' Wealth and Poverty of Nations.
(David Warsh Economic Principals )

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 624 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press; illustrated edition edition (November 12, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 069111854X
• ISBN-13: 978-0691118543
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #26,503 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars One thousand years of Trade and War, January 9, 2008

By	César González Rouco (Madrid, Madrid Spain) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

In the last few years I have been looking for books offering a general overview of the past, and I have realized that many books entitled "History of ...whatever" only provide information about the West, the rest of the world being almost ignored. "Power and Plenty" is different, it is truly a global work so when I found this book I decided it to give it a chance (despite the fact that although the book's subtitle is "Trade, War, and the World Economy in the Second Millennium", however, trade from 1000 to 1500 takes up only 55 pages of the 540-plus pages of the book's narrative).

Pursuant to the authors, "the pattern of trade can only be understood as being the outcome of some military or political equilibrium between contending powers", which is a big story to tell. After reading Mr. Izaak Van Gaalen's excellent review, I will only add that this work is a definitive economic history of many things, including globalization and trade, but often the accumulation of detail slows the book down; it is not an entertaining read - frankly, for most people it will be too long and too tedious - except when the authors try and explain why things happened in this or that way (e.g. their review of the Pirenne Thesis or when they re-examine the vexing question of why the Industrial Revolution took place in U.K. - why not in Asia); in any event, it is nicely balanced and an excellent reference book for anyone wanting a better understanding of economic developments of the past millennium.I guess will be an essential acquisition for the shelves of specialists.

Therefore, my rating is between 5 (content) and 3 (pleasure, sometimes falling to 1, sometimes raising to 4).

Additionally, as a complement to "Power and Plenty", I would also suggest reading (hoping that will be of use for those looking for a broad framework to understand the past) the following works, whose scope is as amazingly global as "Power and Plenty": 1. Agrarian cultures: "Pre-industrial societies" by Patricia Crone; 2. Economy: "The world economy. A millennial perspective" (2001) plus "The world economy: Historical Statistics" (2003) by Angus Maddison (a combined edition of these two volumes appeared on December 2007); 3. Government: "The History of Government" by S.E. Finer; 4. Ideas: "Ideas, a History from Fire to Freud", by Peter Watson; 5. Religion: "The Phenomenon of Religion: A Thematic Approach" by Moojan Momen; and 6. War: "War in Human Civilization" by Azar Gat.

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars World Trade in the Second Millenium, January 8, 2008

By	Izaak VanGaalen (San Francisco, CA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

According to Ricardo's theory of trade and comparative advantage, nations reach economic quilibrium through the reciprocity of supply and demand. He was assuming, of course, that all markets were free and all actors rational. This was the ideal rather than the real. Now, economists Ronald Findlay and Kevin O'Rourke advance a modified version of this thesis: trade, or the flow of supply and demand, must be understood within the context political and military equilibrium. It was John Kenneth Gailbraith who said that economics is a political contruct. The authors of this new book attempt to interpret the last 1,000 years of world history where trade flows were determined by "the barrel of a Maxim gun, the edge of a scimitar, or the ferocity of a nomadic horseman."

Many historians and economists have written world economic histories, but they have focused on only particular regions. For example, Eric Jones in The European Miracle: Environments, Economies and Geopolitics in the History of Europe and Asia saw history from a European perspective and, on the other side, Kenneth Pomeranz's The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy. was told from a more sinocentric point of view. The authors of this work give a more balanced account, treating all the regions equally. The authors believe that politics determines economics more than the other way around focus their attention first and foremost on global conflict and geopolitics.

The authors argue that there were three great world historical events that shaped the Second Millenium. The first being Pax Mongolica established by Genghis Khan and the nomads of Central Asia. This established by force the first common market stretching from Western Europe to the Sea of Japan. It resulted in a huge increase in population as well as an increase in economic output. It also brought with it microbes which caused the Black Death in Europe.

The second transformational event was the discovery of the New World along with further exploration of Africa and Asia. This was in many ways a consequence of the first event. The period from 1500 to 1650 was known as the Age of Mercantilism. The authors focus on political and military strategies adopted by Asians to counter European colonial and mercantile policies.

The third transformational event was the Industrial Revolution. Its importance to the last two centuries almost cannot be overemphasized. The technological world we live in today got its start in Northern England two hundred years ago. It marked the beginnig of the "great divergence" in wealth among nations. It had a direct influence on the Napoleonic Wars and World Wars I and II. It also lead to Pax Britannica and, after World War II, Pax Americana.

The authors describe the successive eras of world trade as they were determined by imperialism and global conflict. In each new era a different set of geopolitical relations is established, each time altering the currents of trade. The authors hope that some lessons can be learned from the violence and injustice of past conflicts as newly emerging powers such as China and India take the world stage today. There are presently centrifugal and centripetal forces at work: centripetal being the ever-integrating force of technological progress and centrifugal being anti-globalization backlash. This book can provide valuable information regarding these two forces.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fine Overview and Synthesis; 4.5 Stars, May 17, 2008

By	R. Albin (Ann Arbor, Michigan United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This well written book is a successful effort to summarize and synthesize a large secondary literature on the history of international trade over the last millenium. The authors adopt a chronological approach starting at 1000 CE and conclude with the recent re-emergence of the high degree of global trade in the last half century. The first chapter offers an overview and methodological discussion. Chapter 2, which stresses the economic importance and sophistication of the Islamic world and China, reconstructs the state of the Eurasian international economy. Chapter 3 describes the positive effects of the emergence of the Mongol Empire with its great facilitation of trans-Eurasian trade, followed by wholesale transformation of the Eurasian world by the consequent Black Death and its various sequealae. Chapter 4 describes the European voyages around Africa and the beginning of the integration of the Western Hemisphere into the Eurasian, now world economy. This is all very well done and the authors do a good job of summarizing the significant secondary literature on these topics with a nicely critical approach to the often fragmentary data. The emphasis, throughout, is on the interaction of economics and political history. Much of this, however, will be familiar to those with a good knowledge of history.

The authors really hit their stride and introduce a significant level of analysis with Chapter 5, which discusses European Mercantilism, and the succeeding chapters. The higher level of description and analysis is probably due to the availability of more complete data, particularly for European trade and economic performance. Chapter 6, on the Industrial Revolution, is a very thoughtful discussion of the literature on the origins of the Industrial Revolution in Britain, concluding with a sophisticated multifactorial description of the emergence of the first Industrial economy. The authors do a very nice job of stressing contingent features and the role of political and social history. The subsequent chapters, on the 19th century economy, the disatrous effects of the World Wars and the re-emergence of a high degree of global trade in the last half century, are excellent.

The quality of writing is quite good, the authors are careful to avoid using a lot of economics technical language, though a basic knowledge of economics is very helpful in reading this book, and the bibliography is comprehensive. Unlike many historians, and like many economists, the authors make good use of charts and graphs. It would have been helpful to have a few overview figures summarizing trade flows during the different periods discussed by the authors.