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A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World (The Princeton Economic History of the Western World)

3.8 out of 5 stars 71 customer reviews
ISBN-13: 978-0691141282
ISBN-10: 0691141282
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Product Details

  • Series: The Princeton Economic History of the Western World
  • Paperback: 432 pages
  • Publisher: Princeton University Press (January 18, 2009)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0691141282
  • ISBN-13: 978-0691141282
  • Product Dimensions: 5.7 x 1.3 x 8.7 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (71 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #264,781 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

By Omer Belsky on October 12, 2007
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
Did you know that the average person's life in the Stone Age was no worse then that of the average 17th century Briton? That given their more varied nutrition and lesser workload, the lives of hunter gatherers were superior to both? That the Black Death caused a major improvement in European standards of livings during the 14th to 16th centuries? That the institutional conditions for economic growth, as normally understood, were better in the Middle Ages then they are today?

These are only few of the mind blowing and well documented claims put forward in Gregory Clark's breathtaking - there is no other word - "A Farewell to Alms". Clark confronts the greatest mystery of human history - why did the West leap forward, breaking away from millennia of stasis, to create the modern, industrial world? Clark not only refutes most of the common wisdom about the rise of the West, but also brings forth an astonishing array of data in support of a radically new interpretation. No doubt some specialists would disagree with Clark's conclusions; I have my doubts, too - but Clark's methodology, his thoroughness, and the rigorous manner in which he addresses a huge quantity of data makes "A Farewell to Alms" an instant classic and a model for all economic history.

Clark describes world economic history as essentially a two-phase story. The first phase, from the dawn of time to the Industrial Revolution, featured a barely changing world governed by the cold and remorseless laws of Malthus and Darwin. But those same laws brought on a slow revolution, and a new phenomenon was emerging - first in Europe, and slower in India, China and Japan - Economic Man.
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Format: Hardcover
The perennial question asked by economic historians is why some countries grow excedingly rich and others remain miserably poor. It is a question that writers of "big history" have asked: notably Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (Bantam Classics), David S Landes in The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor, and Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. These works rely heavily on theory beyond the mere retelling of certain facts and events. It is in this tradition that Gregory Clark, economic historian at the University of California at Davis, presents the economic history of the the world. The underlying theory that informs his version is that social and possibly biological evolution explains economic growth. The specter of social darwinism haunts his imagination.

For Clark the critical stage of social evolution is when a society is able to emerge from the Malthusian trap of poverty. It is at this point where they diverge from the pack and actually experience social progress and economic growth.

Regarding the Malthusian trap, Clark argues that the well-being of the average person around 1800 was no better than the average hunter-gatherer 10,000 years earlier.
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Format: Hardcover
This book is absolutely amazing, on a par with Diamond's Guns Germs and Steel.

The industrial revolution allowed England to escape what has been called the Malthusian Trap--a condition common to every pre-industrial society. In the Malthusian Trap, any recognizeable gain in wealth by a society would result in a slight increase in population. As the population would rise, however, living standards would go down, and the death rate would go up. For this reason, population growth remained at a glacial pace of 0.005% for thousands of years. Then the industrial revolution happened. For the first time, population and prospertiy could increase in lockstep, trending ever upwards over long periods of time.

By why did this happen in some places and not in others? Despite its many benefits, why has it proven to be so difficult to export the industrial model to other areas of the world? These are but a few of the questions that Clark addresses in his original and thought provoking book.

What I have taken away from this book is that a lot of good will and human effort has been wasted by not taking in to account the significant differences that exist between people and cultures. We falsely assume that the fruits of industrialization are so obviously desirable that other peoples should do whatever they have to do to make the necessary adaptations to reap its rewards. But we are largely ignorant of why this can't so easily be done. The industrial revolution came to be within the context of a certain unique culture, and it makes sense that it could not be easily duplicated among other people with different values and ways of life.

In attempting to explain the differences in wealth between one population and the next, Clark's approach is cultural.
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