Publications

Starting with the dawn of market capitalism in Renaissance Italy, Professor Reinert works at the intersection of economic ideas, policies, and practices in history, particularly as seen through the lens of national strategies in international competition. He seeks to... View Details

Book Review

In margine a un bilancio sui lumi europei." A review of The Case for the Enlightenment: Scotland and Naples, 1680–1760, by John Robertson

Keywords: Society; Information; History; Scotland; Italy

2018
Introduction

Introduction: History and Political Economy

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Robert Fredona

This volume offers a snapshot of the resurgent historiography of political economy in the wake of the ongoing global financial crisis, and suggests fruitful new agendas for research on the political-economic nexus as it has developed in the Western world since the end... View Details

Keywords: Economics; Government and Politics; History

2017
Working Paper

Merchants and the Origins of Capitalism

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Robert Fredona

N.S.B. Gras, the father of Business History in the United States, argued that the era of mercantile capitalism was defined by the figure of the “sedentary merchant,” who managed his business from home, using correspondence and intermediaries, in contrast to the earlier... View Details

Keywords: Economic Systems; History; Business History

SSRN

2019
Chapter

Merchants and the Origins of Capitalism

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Robert Fredona

N.S.B. Gras, the father of business history in the United States, argued that the era of mercantile capitalism was defined by the figure of the “sedentary merchant,” who managed his business from home, using correspondence and intermediaries, in contrast to the earlier... View Details

Keywords: Economic Systems; History; Business History

10 Oct 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, October 10, 2017

forthcoming New York: Palgrave Macmillan New Perspectives on the History of Political Economy By: Fredona, Robert, and Sophus A. Reinert, eds. Abstract—This volume offers a... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2022
Article

Before Plagiarism: Lawyers and Copynorms in Europe, 1300–1600

By: Robert Fredona and Sophus A. Reinert

This essay uses the concept of 'copynorms', social norms about copying expressive works that can be distinct from legal norms about the same, in order to understand the meaning of intellectual property among Roman law and canon law jurists from the fourteenth through... View Details

Keywords: Copyright; History; Europe

Spring 2020
Article

Political Economy and the Medici

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Robert Fredona

Spring 2020
Article

Italy and the Origins of Capitalism

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Robert Fredona

April 2015 (Revised October 2019)
Case

The Great Divergence: Europe and Modern Economic Growth

The continent of Europe seemed in the spring of 2015 to be in a weaker position relative to other world regions than it had in centuries. Though comparatively small, it had long played a disproportionate role in world history, to the extent that the modern world system... View Details

Keywords: The Great Divergence; Modern Economic Growth; Empire; Disruption; Economic Growth; Values and Beliefs; History; Globalization; Europe

Educators

13 Feb 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, February 13, 2018

Jealousy of Trade and the History of Political Thought By: Kapossy, Béla, Isaac Nakhimovsky, Sophus A. Reinert, and Richard Whatmore, eds.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2016
Book

Antonio Serra and the Economics of Good Government

By: Rosario Patalano and Sophus A. Reinert

Little is known of Antonio Serra except that he wrote his extraordinary 1613 Short Treatise on the Causes That Make Kingdoms Abound in Gold and Silver even in the Absence of Mines in a Neapolitan jail and that he died there soon afterwards. However, the... View Details

Keywords: History; Books; Government and Politics; Economics

2021
Working Paper

Caccia Selvaggia: Myth, Rites, and the Right in Carlo Ginzburg's Storia notturna

By: Robert Fredona and Sophus A. Reinert

Carlo Ginzburg (b. 1939) is widely considered one of Europe’s leading historians. His masterpiece Storia notturna (Turin: Einaudi, 1989), widely praised for its extraordinary erudition and creativity, is now over three decades old but it continues to inspire... View Details

Keywords: Mythology; Culture; Political Doctrine; History; Government and Politics; Society

12 Jun 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, June 12, 2018

forthcoming Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press The Academy of Fisticuffs: Political Economy and Commercial Society in Enlightenment Italy By: Reinert, Sophus A.... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

26 Sep 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, September 26, 2017

and a fast-growing market. There was a growing need to incorporate local relevance into global products and to respond to local competitors. Download working paper:... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2016
Working Paper

Mapping the Economic Grand Tour: Travel and International Emulation in Enlightenment Europe

As the itinerant wizard (technically one of the Maiar, if not the Istari) Gandalf wrote to the then domestically-inclined hobbit Frodo Baggins in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, “Not all those who wander are lost.” Indeed, as the recent brouhaha over the... View Details

Keywords: Behavior; Globalization

2018
Book

The Academy of Fisticuffs: Political Economy and Commercial Society in Enlightenment Italy

The terms “capitalism” and “socialism” continue to haunt our political and economic imaginations, but we rarely consider their interconnected early history. Even the 18th century had its “socialists,” but unlike those of the 19th, they paradoxically sought to make the... View Details

Keywords: Enlightenment; Political Economy; Italy; Commercial Society; Economic Systems; Trade; History; Markets; Society; Italy