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Prosperity and Violence: The Political Economy of Development

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The central message of Bates' 'Prosperity and Violence' is that the international environment in which states are born and develop determines the relationship that evolves between their citizens and governments. States born of war harness their political arm and its monopoly on violence in the service of economic growth, while the 'fictive' states of the post-war world never develop such a link successfully. This message both adds and detracts from what Bates spends most of the book exploring, ie the domestic mechanisms by which economic and political goals become intertwined and mutually reinforcing.

It adds in that Bates clearly outlines the stark differences between the international conditions faced by early modern European states and those faced by new post-war states. The former faced an environment of competition over scarce land and resources, without any single dominant state. Monarchs, who Bates calls 'specialists in the use of violence', required funding to fight, which as war grew more costly could only come from productive economies. Within states, violence rose along with incomes, as factions attempted to seize the gains of others. This created a demand for effective systems of national justice, which monarchs were able to provide by repression and cooptation of uncooperative parties. At the same time, by limiting their own extractive powers over the economy through institutions such as parliaments, monarchs were able to credibly commit to repaying risky war debt. The private provision of violence, used in kinship societies to maintain social order at the cost of economic growth, was thus refashioned into public provision of force in service of economic growth.

In the second half of the book, Bates outlines the different context faced by post-war states: a bi-polar international system in which superpowers policed conflicts in the periphery and transferred resources directly to their client developing states. Developing states tended to adopt similar economic policies to early European states: import-substitution policies to protect and grow domestic industry at the expense of exports; use of their bureaucratic apparatus to distribute food. But politically, because of the dampening effect of the cold war on local conflict, the military imperative that forced European monarchs to limit their own powers in order to achieve their goals was absent. Rulers of developing states never developed the view that the economies they oversaw were a strategic resource to be nurtured in order to provide future capital; accountability through political institutions for public spending never developed.

This is where Bates' argument runs into trouble. Even as he criticizes Putnam's model of social capital in favor of his own explanation, emphasizing the necessity of the state to harness private violence into public service, he missteps as Putnam did in his work on regional development in Italy. Bates' argument is too specific to the context in which it was developed: early modern European states were successful in marrying political and economic development because they existed in the unique environment of early modern Europe. Outside Europe, the few states lucky enough to be born out of war (Japan, Turkey, China and to a lesser extent Brazil) have enjoyed the same prosperity that arises from the taming and redirection of state-sanctioned violence towards productive rather than extractive ends.

As for the rest, namely the rich African case studies that motivated and illustrate this work, there seems little hope for successful political and economic development. Like Putnam's work on Italy, Bates has shown those in developing states the golden road to economic growth and political accountability. But by making success conditional upon the prevailing international conditions, he seems to put this beyond reach both for the elites and publics of developing nations. Though the story he weaves of European development is convincing, the book fails to move beyond a specific explanation of development in that context to development more generally.

"Prosperity and Violence" by Robert Bates is a re-examination of the role played by government's coercive power in developing nations. In previous studies, scholars have focused their attention on societies undergoing economic and political transformation, while ignoring larger and more developed societies. Bates, however, sees lessons for the study of development today in the experiences of countries that industrialized hundreds of years ago. Using a supply and demand theory of violence provision, he goes back to the formation of society and the state to examine how states go about increasing per-capita wealth, and how the organization of power, in particular the use of violence, affects the trajectory of development. As Bates has learned firsthand through his experiences in Latin America and Africa, much of the world has yet to find the perfect prescription for political and economic stability. By contrasting those states that were successful in early industrialization with those who have struggled in the Post-WW2 period, Bates seeks to draw out patterns that may help guide the way for developing nations.

The story begins with a discussion of the importance of kinship in agrarian society. In these societies, production, consumption and accumulation of wealth was organized at the level of the family. As population grew and families diffused, gains from specialization and trade were realized, but so too did the incentives for violence. To safeguard themselves, families organized their own protection, but any peace forged this way was uncertain. Due to the uncertainty surrounding one's property, there existed little reason to invest in the future. Instead, a family was better served by simplifying and making their possessions less appealing to would-be thieves, presenting families with an unfortunate choice to be made between peace and prosperity.

Out of this violence, according to Bates, emerged certain "fighting lineages" that were successful in their battles, but soon found pillaging the emerging trading centers less prosperous than setting up permanent residence and collecting taxes. In exchange for revenues, heads of towns provided safety, eliminating the need for private citizens to engage in costly battles. To further increase their take, these heads of fighting lineages delegated authority, provided cheaper raw materials, and shut out foreign markets. With the provision of violence now monopolized, towns could be confident that their attempts to form capital would bear fruit. As wealth spread to rural areas, so too did the violence that plagued urban areas. A demand for peace existed, and those with the ability to provide it did so for a fee. With large towns and rural areas coming under the protection of the same person, an early form of the state, paid for by citizens, was established.

Bates next addresses development, namely the lack thereof, in modern states. His contention is that rivalry between the global powers following World War Two left leaders of modern developing states without the same incentives to liberalize their economies. Unlike early developing states, few heads of state were driven to structure their economies to provide security because they could count on aid and protection from the United States or the U.S.S.R. The economic situation changed markedly with the early 1980's credit crisis. Those with capital were hesitant to loan to developing nations, meaning that the programs of import substitution and rapid development had to be halted, and control of the economy taken out of the hands of the state. Politically, states dependent on foreign aid found themselves in a precarious position after the end of the Cold War. No longer concerned with nations falling into communist hands, advanced-industrial nations made receiving foreign capital contingent on democratization. Without foreign aid, leaders who resisted economic liberalization found themselves unable to purchase the support of local factions and retain power, while the states that were ultimately successful in their transition diffused their power, giving political elites reason to help pay the cost of government.

The book's size makes certain omissions necessary, but I was left wondering about gaps in the history he provided. For example, between chapters two and three Bates jumps from agrarian societies to bustling 14th century European ports. How, given the uncertainty surrounding accumulation of capital, did these agrarian societies survive without a central authority to monopolize violence? Are we to assume that a Darwinian process slowly crept through Europe and when all was said and done flourishing towns were what remained? For many nations, the path to a liberal economy was slow and violent. Unfortunately, Bates decides not to cover the fits and starts that have accompanied development, and the reader is left without any pre-modern examples where attempted political and economic liberalization failed.

Finally, while Bates presents a cogent and non-technical argument, I found his use of short digressions to illustrate his points troubling. Instead of using one or two cases throughout the book, when turning to development in the modern world Bates' strategy is to quickly address a case that proves the point he is making. Far more illuminating would have been to look at why, in the context of this argument, certain decisions regarding economic policy and political organization resulted in success or failure. A related complaint is that and Asia is left entirely out of the discussion. Bates mentions Japan in the context of countries who modernized to build their military, but where do China, Korea, and India fit into this model? While his theory appears sound, empirics are nowhere to be found. More nuance is needed if this book is to provide useful direction to developing nations on how to develop economically and politically.

Ultimately, there is a lot to like about "Prosperity and Violence." Bates concisely presents an interesting and logically sound rational choice explanation for the different paths toward development taken by early societies and does so without drifting into discipline-specific terminology or methodology. This book assumes little about the reader's abilities going in, and as such is a valuable way for one to introduce themselves to the rich field of work that walks the line between political science and economics. However, due to its brevity and lack of empirical rigor my recommendation is qualified. One can easily read this book and agree that Bates has an explanation for political and economic development, but that he might not have the explanation.

Had he come of age in Uganda in the early 1980s, would Thomas Hobbes have written Leviathan in the same way as the classic work of political theory he penned in the aftermath of the English civil war more than three centuries earlier? For Robert Bates the answer is an affirmative one. That he can make such a claim is both the strength and weakness of his slim, provocative volume on the political economy of development.

The book's subject is the politics and economics of what Karl Polanyi (1944) described as "the great transformation," that is, the movement of societies from village to city, from agriculture to industry. Bates seeks to explain variation in the extent to which different countries have experienced this transformation. In his account this structural change is essentially the story of development, which consists of two primary elements. First, it includes an economic dimension, which refers to the growth of per capita incomes in a society. Second, development has a political dimension, which implies the "domestication of violence" for productive rather than predatory social ends. The interplay of these two themes--prosperity and violence--animates Bates's exploration of the historical and contemporary experiences of developing societies.

Although he may overstate the novelty of his approach, unlike many studies in the contemporary field of development, this analysis centers on comparison of the political-economic trajectories of countries in different periods of history. The core of the book is organized around a quartet of chapters that cover different aspects of the development process. These chapters proceed sequentially to analyze agrarian societies, the formation of states, state formation in the modern era, and shocks to the global system at the end of the 20th century. This historical approach risks repeating the mistakes of more naïve versions of modernization theory, which assume that societies move through specific stages to reach a kind of "development" that looks suspiciously like contemporary US or Western European liberal democracies. However, Bates avoids this by identifying both commonalties and differences between the experience of societies historically in Europe and those struggling to develop in the contemporary world.

His basic argument is that differences in the structure and use of coercion explain differences in development, both historically and today. Explanation unfolds as follows. As agrarian societies, which are dominated by the institution of family, expand they make economic gains. These gains require protection. Protection in such societies is supplied privately through existing kinship institutions; it can be effective, but it is also fragile because the behaviors and beliefs that supply peace also encourage behavior, such as honor-bound retaliation, that increases the likelihood of violence. Perversely, people may thus try to avoid the costs of violence by choosing limit their economic activities, trapping them between peace and prosperity. In the formation of the modern state in Europe, Bates sees the advent of "political forces that break the fetters limiting development in agrarian societies" (p. 49). Expanding population and the rise of towns generated new income, but also increased conflict. Specialists in violence needed funds to fight their wars and the victors allied their political force with the economic machinery of specific towns and larger territories. The result of this alliance, Bates contends, was a new mutually reinforcing political-economic order in which violence was "tamed"-- reorganized from kinship groups to kingdoms and early states--to enhance the productive use of society's resources.

This describes "classical" development in the case of Europe, but it is insufficient to explain development and underdevelopment in the post-World War II period. Like dependency theorists and many other observers, Bates argues that development in this "modern era" is different in that states that developed earlier dominate in the international system. Unlike such theorists, however, he does not concur that the relative weakness of developing countries accounts for their economic policy choices. Instead, the failure of many countries to develop can be located in the structure of the interstate system, which did not provide incentives for many countries to fortify their political economies by securing finances from their citizens in exchange for protection. The military threat they faced was less and external sources of revenue were often available, so the governments of such countries did not feel compelled to develop the liberal political institutions conducive to development. The debt crisis of the 1980s and the fall of the Soviet Union provide further explanation of differential patterns of development. These twin shocks, Bates argues, removed the props that had supported political order in the "fictive states of the developing world" (p. 100), thus inhibiting economic growth.

Bates's ability to distill a concise argument about development from complex political and economic histories in Europe, Africa, and Latin America is impressive and largely compelling. But the level of simplification he achieves risks glossing over important aspects of the story, including those that might undermine his argument. For example, he skips over whole period of colonialism, the effects of which are largely absent from his account. In his quest for parsimony he also neglects the experience of the Americas, including the US. These countries generally gained independence well before the "modern" period the book addresses and thus may pose a challenge to his argument. Finally, even as he digs into the dirty reality of power and violence that he views as either underpinning or undermining prosperity, one still has the sense of development as a more or less rational unfolding of ever more felicitous political institutions. A finer-grained account might have strengthened his overall argument by also describing the unintended consequences, strange historical breaks, and uncertainty that must have characterized at least some aspects of historical processes of (under)development.

In the last pages of the book Bates recounts how he turns to Hobbes in trying to make sense of the political and economic situation he confronted in Uganda as an advisor for the World Bank in the early 1980s. He juxtaposes the terms of the World Bank Mission to that country and the famous paragraph in Hobbes' Leviathan that ends with "the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." Such a broad-brush approach that sees equivalence in social contexts separated by more than 300 years and nearly 3000 miles will not appeal to everyone. It certainly leaves gaps. But whether one ultimately agrees with the approach, Bates has written a highly readable, thought-provoking book that should be of interest to a wide audience concerned with understanding the tangled political-economic roots of development.

In his book, Prosperity and Violence: The Political Economy of Development, Robert Bates examines how underdeveloped societies transform from rural and agrarian to urban and industrial. Exploring the vast history of the modern state, Bates draws on numerous case studies to formulate a general theory that explains how societies make this great transformation. Central to his argument is the link between prosperity and violence. Perhaps no different from many scholars of development, he contends that agrarian societies face a debilitating cycle where prosperity begets violence which further restricts prosperity. Thus, we would assume that these societies are doomed to stagnation. But if this is so, how might developed industrial societies have come about? One may expect that the solution exists in somehow driving a wrench in the cycle and eliminating the encumbering violence. But Bates takes an unusual perspective and offers an unexpected and fascinating explanation. He argues that in order for societies to develop successfully, they must embrace their propensity for violence and use it to their own advantage. By domesticating coercion to cultivate investments and encourage economic growth, societies utilize violence to overcome stagnation and ultimately transform themselves into prosperous developing states.

To understand development, Bates first explores what causes its failure. He begins by examining societies that are predominately agrarian, rural, and dominated by kinship. These kinship societies invest in migration and expansion to control new resources and overcome diminishing returns. They specialize in production, form markets, and engage in exchange. They manage the risks of nature by diversification and reliance on family support. They devise means to promote family welfare and to raise the expected level of income per capita. Economically, these societies have the ingredients for prosperity and development. However they are often characterized by poverty. So, why do they fail?

The answer, Bates claims, is in the penchant for violence and a particular formation of political institutions. Violence takes root in agrarian societies and instills fear amongst the people. Eventually this fear lends to the formation of a political system that survives on deterrence. To illustrate this point, Bates draws on the Nuer of Southern Sudan. The Nuer lacked formal institutions such as a court, a functioning police system, or any inkling of a central government. Although one might picture life as brutish and short in such a case, they actually maintained relative harmony. The reason was simple: everyone was so darned afraid of everyone else. They didn't steal from one another for fear of fierce retaliation. And because the Nuer were so inclined to act violently at the slightest provocation, violence rarely occurred. Peace was maintained, but it was fickle and came at a cost of prosperity. Those within such a society become so concerned with protecting themselves that they easily prefer being destitute over the risk of acquiring wealth. Inevitably, the system thwarts production and progress, and society becomes indolent. The result is stagnation and poverty. And thus, as Bates explains, these agrarian societies fail to develop and never make it to the great transformation.

In contrast, the second half of the book focuses on how these societies manage to overcome the obstacle of violence that blocks the path to development. Bates' answer is seemingly simple and yet strangely intuitive. He contends that violence (or more appropriately, coercion) needs to be tamed by the state and publicly provisioned rather than privately provided. Unlike agrarian societies that use coercion as a means of predation, industrial societies find a way to successfully distribute such force so as to promote economic growth. Specialists in violence emerge who learn to invest their power in those that efficiently produce capital. As in the case with medieval monarchies, rulers voluntarily delegated authority to citizens to govern their own affairs. Such liberties allowed people to build economic organizations as well as towns to expand and flourish. In agrarian societies, political force effectively suffocates economic prosperity, whereas in industrialized societies, political force works to promote economic prosperity. The point is clear, this alignment of politics and economics is essential to a society's development.

Bates supports his argument through a plethora of historical and modern applications. Each assumption seems to be supported by at least a tid-bit of evidence from the past. However, I cannot help but question the details. His argument is generalized to span across ages, but he seems to pick and choose the subject matter to stand up to his test. The theory appears robust, but I would have liked to have seen more evidence, data perhaps, that further called on cases of agrarian and industrial societies. Would the theory still hold?

Other than that, Robert Bates presents a tantalizing argument that departs from the usual approach for interpreting development. He effectively links economic prosperity with political violence in an analysis that should shake the field.

What is the book about?

Robert Bates analyses the process of transformation of agrarian societies to industrial societies. His main focus is on the political and economic aspects of this transformation. He analyses the process of domestication (institutionalization and management) of violence - the `coercive force' - in agricultural societies that lead to increased prosperity in industrial societies. This is because the inefficacy of private provisions of security is overcome in industrial societies.

Analysis of kinship societies

I found his analysis of the kinship societies such as the Neur societies as most interesting. These societies are able to maintain law and order in absence of formal dispute resolution institutions such as courts and tribunals. It is interesting for me because I am able to relate this concept to the society I come from. The society in my village is divided into different groups based on castes and religion. The contentious issues are decided on the caste considerations and not on the merit of the issue at hand. For example, if a caste member does something wrong, he gets the backing of his caste irrespective of other considerations. Though it is changing now, due in part to provision of courts and other dispute resolution bodies, it points to a method by which these villages were able to maintain peace. Some castes have a reputation for fierce temper and ability to mobilize for their caste brethren. Probably, it points to relatively recent assimilation of these castes in Indian mainstream. In fact, Jats, a caste for fierce reputation is of recent origin, having immigrated to India latter than others. It is worse in tribal societies such as Baluchistan in Pakistan. Concept of honor is the central tenet of these tribes. Honor killings (killing of women by their own family members to salvage their reputation) are an integral part of these tribal societies.

The author takes a sympathetic view of kinship societies. He dismisses the view held by other sociologists that these societies are static (opposed to change) or not interested in expansion. On the contrary, these societies expand by investing in youth and sending them as scouts to look for opportunities elsewhere. From my village and other surrounding villages, a lot of people have migrated to Kolkatta, Assam and other areas. After the youth had established themselves in these areas, they called their own caste members to work with them. Many of the rich families in India today, for example the Birla family, had been helped in a similar manner when their youth were looking for opportunities. GD Birla stayed in an accommodation provided by his caste members and ate in mess subsidized by the caste members who had emigrated earlier. This caste of Marwaris controls the majority stake in trade and commerce in India today. They have institutionalized the concept of `help' for their struggling members. In majority of Indian cities today, there are subsidized accommodation and eating places provided by this community. They also help their caste members in education and for other activities such as marriage of a girl child (it is costlier to marry a girl child in India). Other communities such as Punjabis and Gujaratis have followed a similar pattern for emigration to Western nations. After a young member successfully immigrates to a new land, he calls his other family members and members of his clan. He supports the newly emigrated members financially and in other ways so that clan as a whole benefits. In Antwerp, Holland, a particular caste from Palanpur has a majority stake in diamond trade. They followed similar pattern to emigration.

Bates insight

Perhaps, the biggest contribution is Bates insight in wealth predatory and wealth creating states. One could take his analysis a step further and hypothesize the reason for difference in wealth and poverty of nations today. Jared Diamond does a terrific job to incorporate the idea of geographic determinism in development of human societies. Landes tries to ascribe culture as the factor. North assimilates these two ideas by propagating the centrality of institutions in the developmental debate. After a thorough analysis, there is no doubt that institutions have been the deciding factors. But the question is, "Why would the institutions be different in the first place"? What made some societies to develop institutions that were no more than re-distributive agencies of wealth in the best case (the Incas, the Spain) and repressive agencies at worst (India, China)? I think insight provided by Bates can point an answer to this question.

An analysis using Bates insight

Case of England

In England the crown did not have enough wealth (collected by taxation) to finance wars and be engaged in other activities that would increase his influence and power. Therefore the crown had to encourage activities such as trade that increased their tax base. It helped the English king was in competition with other countries.

Case of India and China

On the other hand, in India and China, the elites were fabulously rich. This was because they were able to put an efficient system in place to exploit the peasants and enrich themselves at their expense. The system was so efficient that though the Indian and Chinese populace was as rich or as poor as Europe, their kings and other elites were rich many times over. As these countries were isolated, there was no competition with other kingdoms and therefore did not have a need to increase their power base. The Indian and Chinese kings could survive on agrarian society without a need for trade. Therefore, there was no incentive for the ruling elite in India or China to let others engage in trade and lose their leading positions to the traders. When Sir Thomas Roe, English Ambassador to Mughal emperor Jahangir, wanted a trade treaty, Jahangir remarked that what kind of king would concern himself with petty things such as trade.

Contribution of clergy

Since clergy, the priest class, derives its power from the aegis of the elite, they changed the traditions to make them unfavorable to trade. India had a good trading relationship with South-East Asia, Arabia, and other regions. But by the time British established their state in India, sea travel was forbidden by tradition. The moot point is that there were incentives in England and other European states for development of trade, in India and China there were incentives to curb it. It is not true that all the Indian kings opposed trade. Those kings who established dynasties such as Akbar, the Mughal king, built roads, and carried out other projects that increased the tax base. But for their successors, the tax base was so huge that they could squander it in building domes for his favorite wife (out of 300 others) or be engaged in other non-productive works.

Lesson to present governments

Bates book has a lesson for governments existing today. Governments, which can survive merely on predating wealth and redistributing poverty, will impede the economic development of their people. On the other hand, the governments that have to create wealth on account of being accountable to public will improve the quality of life of their citizens. Economic history of independent India testifies to this fact. Pre-1990, the government assumed that its role was to redistribute wealth. Fortunately for us, the debt crisis in 1990's forced the government to abandon the policy of industrial protection, retreat from import-substitution industrialization and led to promotion of exports abroad. Since the quality of life has improved and the people have become more aware the government has become more accountable. Hopefully this trend will continue.

Domestication of violence

Other concepts I found most interesting were the concept of domestication of violence. His illustration of case in Kenya and Uganda bolsters his claim. The reason a risk-averse farmer would be interested in investing in capital when there is peace is a very subtle and important observation. His explanation of natural forces, which lead to the formation of states from agrarian societies, was really interesting. His explanation of process by which these forces would lead to wealth predatory states and others to wealth generating states is very relevant to the present debate on development. To conclude, it is a very analytical book that explains a lot about politics and economics of development.

Recommendation

To summarize, I recommend you find time to read this wonderful book.

Being a double major in political science and economics, it seems that I'm always looking at ways to connect the two subjects. Prosperity and violence does this so brillitanly that i read the book in a matter of a few hours. The book talks about how trade has brought people toghether to create cities to trade creating goverments in order to control and facilitate the process. Through time, goverment and the economy became mutually dependent and modern countires became to develop which the books compares to newly independent countries in the 20th century. The books goes into the present dealing with the cold war and how former allies of America and the USSR are comping with the transition into the 21rst century.