
A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History [pdf] - yarapavan
http://econweb.umd.edu/~wallis/MyPapers/RHH_2006_w12795.pdf
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yarapavan
Abstract:

Neither economics nor political science can explain the process of modern
social development. The fact that developed societies always have developed
economies and developed polities suggests that the connection between
economics and politics must be a fundamental part of the development process.
This paper develops an integrated theory of economics and politics. We show
how, beginning 10,000 years ago, limited access social orders developed that
were able to control violence, provide order, and allow greater production
through specialization and exchange. Limited access orders provide order by
using the political system to limit economic entry to create rents, and then
using the rents to stabilize the political system and limit violence. We call
this type of political economy arrangement a natural state. It appears to be
the natural way that human societies are organized, even in most of the
contemporary world. In contrast, a handful of developed societies have
developed open access social orders. In these societies, open access and entry
into economic and political organizations sustains economic and political
competition. Social order is sustained by competition rather than rent-
creation. The key to understanding modern social development is understanding
the transition from limited to open access social orders, which only a handful
of countries have managed since WWII.

