University Seminar in Economic History
Co-chairs 2020-2021:
Alan Dye, Barnard College ( adye@barnard.edu )
David Weiman, Barnard College ( dweiman@barnard.edu )
Susie Pak, St. John's University ( paks1@stjohns.edu )
RapporteurDavid Samuel Lerer (david.lerer@columbia.edu)
University Economic History Seminar Schedule
Fall 2021
Oct 7
Paul Bouscasse, Columbia University
Nov 4
Cihan Artunc, Middlebury College
Legal Origins of Corporate Governance: Choice of Law in Egypt, 1887–1913
Dec 2
Karen Clay, Carnegie Mellon University
Spring 2022
Feb 3
Michael Andrews, University of Maryland, Baltimore Campus
Informal Social Interactions, Alcohol Prohibition, and Invention
Mar 3
No Seminar
Apr 7
Paul Schmelzing, Yale University
Eight centuries of global real interest rates, varieties of safety, and the ‘suprasecular’ decline, 1311-2018
May 5
Nuno Palma, The University of Manchester
Comparative European Institutions and the Little Divergence, 1385-1800
The seminars for Fall 2021 will be held from 6:30 to 8:00 EST on Zoom. (NOTE the change in time and format). You must register (that is, RSVP) in advance with our rapporteur, David Samuel Lerer, to receive an invitation with the Zoom link and passcode.
The concerns of this seminar are wide ranging in time, place, and method. Emphasis is on the logic of European and American economic growth from feudal times forward with regular, but less frequent, contributions on Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Topics range from microeconomic studies of firms undergoing rapid technical change and households changing their interaction between home and market to more macroeconomic topics concerned with national and regional economic growth performance, the economics of imperialism, and the political economy of the Great Depression. Given the breadth of the seminar’s membership and interests, comparative economic history is often a central element in seminar discussions. Pre-circulation of papers permits vigorous discussion.