Join Andrew Dorman and Lloyd Maphosa as they interview some of the world’s best economic historians and talk about everything economic history. Each episode showcases new and exciting research, as Andrew and Lloyd chat with different experts about their latest publications. We explore a diverse array of subjects that show how the lessons from the past are extremely important for the present, and even more so for the future! All episodes are available here.
This podcast is part of the Centre for Economics, Policy and History (CEPH), the All-Ireland Centre of Excellence in economics, history and policy which combines Trinity College Dublin and Queen’s University Belfast. CEPH is funded by the Higher Education Authority’s North South Research Programme.
Season 3, Episode 13: What happens when you farm a desert? With Mattia Bertazzini
Parts of North Africa are surprisingly fertile, particular around Tunisia and Libya. In the case of the latter, Italy saw a great opportunity to join the colonial bandwagon in the early 20th century and learned that successful ventures require more than just state money. Mattia Bertazzini (Nottingham) joins Lloyd and Andrew to talk about the challenges faced by these farmers, and the local Libyans who were forced to live near them.
Link to article: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13166/
Season 3, Episode 12: Where should you set up a new town? With Kerstin Enflo
Certain places seem to have been around ‘forever’. But planned towns are not a new phenomenon. And in early modern Sweden, the royal family decided that planned towns were the way to economic success. Kerstin Enflo (Lund) chats with Andrew and Lloyd about this programme and discusses whether or not the Swedish monarchs were on to a winner.
Link to article: https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/juecon/v112y2019icp50-69.html/
Season 3, Episode 11: How much is care actually worth? With Jane Humphries
Can you put a value on care? How much does a homemaker add to an economy? And why isn’t this considered in economic thought? Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Jane Humphries to answer all of this and more in this fascinating look at early-modern England.
Link to Lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BoY9W9rZSE/
Season 3, Episode 10: Where should you patent an invention? With Chris Colvin
In another in-person episode, Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Chris Colvin (QUB) to talk about patents. We compare the Dutch and British systems to see which is best, and some of the lessons that modern policymakers might learn about controlling innovation nowadays.
Link to articles: https://ceph.ie/article-re/financing-innovation-the-role-of-patent-examination/
https://www.econstor.eu/handle/10419/315206.2
Season 3, Episode 9: How do you study the global south? With Ewout Frankema
From “Third World” to “Global South”, academia struggles to study large parts of the world with delicacy or accuracy. One of the challenges faced by researchers is assessing the economic impact of colonialism, and it is often the scapegoat for the divergence in growth between North and South. But in this episode, Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Ewout Frankema (Wageningen University), who explains that there may be more to this than meets the eye.
Link to article: https://doi.org/10.1111/joes.12609
Season 3, Episode 8: How do you make a home in Alaska? With Ann Carlos
Alaska is the largest state in the United States of America, with a reputation for remoteness, cold weather, and large moose. Yet despite these disadvantages, the indigenous population retains a strong sense of community and cooperation that endures to this day. Ann Carlos (UC Boulder) chats with Andrew and Lloyd and explores life in Alaska in the 20th century.
Link to article: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/391830364_Resilience_of_Indigenous_communities_in_Alaska_by_1940
Season 3, Episode 7: How does political violence affect the stock market? With Christopher Hartwell
Political violence is nothing new, but it can be tough to measure its impact on the economy. Christopher Hartwell (Kozminski University) talks Andrew and Lloyd through some new ways to measure its impact, using the case of Tsarist Russia as an example.
Link to article: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0968565023000057
Season 3, Episode 6: How does a King sell a state? With Marc Deloof
The Belgian atrocities in the Congo are well known and rightly condemned. But what happened before it became a colony? How did King Leopold attract investment to an area that, prior to the rubber boom, had little to offer?
Link to article: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4743798
Season 3, Episode 5: So you want to be an economic historian? With Áine Doran
Economic history is in a good place. There’s a growing number of new researchers emerging, and people are slowly realising how useful it can be. But what is it like on the front line? Andrew and Lloyd sit down with Áine Doran (UU) for a “state of the nation”, seeing how the discipline is faring and what the future might bring.
Link to article: https://doi.org/10.1177/03324893241293002
Season 3, Episode 4: How do you build a business in a new nation? With Frank Barry
With the War of Independence and the Civil War behind it, 1920s Ireland was faced with opportunities for growth, but it hesitated about how best to go about it. Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Frank Barry (TCD), who walks them through how Ireland built its businesses in the first half of the twentieth century, and asks whether everything was as bad as people say!
Link to book: https://irishhistorybookshop.ie/product/industry-and-policy-in-independent-ireland-1922-1972
Season 3, Episode 3: How do you win at Monopsony? With Judy Stephenson
No, that title isn’t a typo! This week, Andrew and Lloyd are joined by returning guest Judy Stephenson (UCL) to talk about monopsony power in early modern Britain, and ask who the real winners and losers were in these early labour markets.
Link to paper: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13346
Season 3, Episode 2: How do you get people to listen to an economics podcast? With Johan Fourie
Johan Fourie is one of South Africa’s leading economic historians, whose podcast, blog and writing influence the public and policy in equal measure. In this special, in-person episode, Andrew and Lloyd sit down with him to talk about policymaking, economic history, and communication, offering advice for anyone interested in getting their ideas out there in a saturated market.
Season 3, Episode 1: The CEO – What does it take to lead a company? With Michael Aldous and John Turner
In our first episode back, we sit down with Michael Aldous and John Turner to talk about their new book “The CEO”. Can one person really change the fate of a company? How much impact does a CEO really have? And have they gotten worse over time? Tune in to find out!
Link to book: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/ceo/5E4A432AD7B3149BB81BEB64A5F65F03
Season 2, Episode 8: How do you run an Egyptian business? With Mohamed Saleh
Egypt’s history stretches back thousands of years, and Cleopatra is closer to us than she was to the construction of the pyramids. However, since we only had an hour, Andrew and Lloyd talked with Mohamed Saleh (LSE) about Egyptian businesses in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and tried to unpick the web of business management and finance in a newly independent state.
Season 2, Episode 7: How did the Great Migration influence US elections? With Vicky Fouka
In an election year in the United States, there is no better time to talk about American history. Andrew and Lloyd sat down with Vicky Fouka (Stanford University) to discuss the second Great Migration and how it affected American politics in the 20th Century.
Season 2, Episode 6: How do you found a brand new nation? With Leigh Gardner
Liberia stands as a fascinating case study of what happens if a new nation is established, seemingly out of the blue. Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Leigh Gardner (LSE) to talk about what led to the foundation of this west-Africa country and its economic fortunes in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Link to Book: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/sovereignty-without-power/1AE1550713B8F8FC4AA55143F475AE004
Season 2, New Year’s Special: Will Everything Be Alright? With Ronan Lyons, Barra Roantree, John Turner and Gaia Narciso
2024 was a year of some highs and many lows across the globe. But how has Ireland faired? What can economic history tell us about Ireland’s performance during troubled or tumultuous times? And what should policymakers bear in mind over the next 12 months? To answer this, Andrew is joined by a panel of expert economic historians to discuss what happened last year, and what to expect in 2025.
Season 2, Episode 5: How do you raise a Celtic Tiger? With Seán Kenny
Ireland’s economic growth in the twentieth century is nothing short of miraculous. But how did this happen, and why wasn’t it even across the island? Joining Andrew and Lloyd is Seán Kenny (UCC, Lund) who explains Ireland’s wealth, its divide, and what might happen in the future. We also discuss the trials and tribulations of hosting an economic history podcast! Seán hosts the Economic History podcast, which you should absolutely listen to (once you have finished with this episode).
Link to podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-economic-history-podcast/id1513552663https://open.spotify.com/show/7xzAHy5zOSFztWy0R0cmCx
Season 2, Episode 4: How does a world get rich? With Mark Koyama
In this episode, Andrew and Lloyd don the hats of podcast grifters and talk about wealth. However, we are not selling bitcoin or panning for gold, but instead talking about how countries become wealthy and why some areas are richer than others. To do this, we sit down with Mark Koyama (George Mason University) and put the interest in compound interest.
Disclaimer: There is no guarantee you will get rich by listening to this episode.
Link to books:
- https://www.wiley.com/en-us/How+the+World+Became+Rich%3A+The+Historical+Origins+of+Economic+Growth-p-9781509540235
- https://www.amazon.com/How-World-Became-Rich-Historical/dp/1509540237
Season 2, Episode 3: How do you re-write a history of North America? With Ann Carlos
As the character Ron Swanson once declared in the TV show Parks and Recreation “History began on July 4th 1776. Everything before that was a mistake”. Of course, this is nonsense, but what was the economic history of America before and during European settlement? To find out, Andrew and Lloyd are joined by Ann Carlos (University of Colorado Boulder) and talk about the American history you might have missed!
Link to video of lecture: https://youtu.be/SXsk0xr0hI8
Season 2, Episode 2: How has Africa’s economy developed? With Ellen Hillbom and Erik Green
In this episode, Andrew and Lloyd sit down with Ellen Hillbom and Erik Green (Lund University) and tackle a millennium of African Economic history in approximately 50 minutes. They take a step back from the doom-and-gloom attitudes towards the continent that were fostered in the 1990s, and instead present a more complete, optimistic picture of the development of this fascinating continent.
Link to book: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-14008-3#
Season 2, Episode 1: Did Reconstruction save the United States of America? With Richard Grossman
In the first episode of our brand new season, Andrew and Lloyd sit down with Richard Grossman (Wesleyan University) and discuss reconstruction in the United States of America. Was it a policy success story, and if not, why not? What could have been done to smooth the transition from war-riven slave-state to modern America?
Link to paper: /https://economics.harvard.edu/sites/hwpi.harvard.edu/files/econ/files/freedom_road_dead_end.pdf?m=1699280104
Link to book: https://richardsgrossman.com/WRONG/
Season 1, Episode 7: Why can’t you take a train to Donegal? With Alan Fernihough
Andrew and Lloyd were stuck on Irish trains recently, and wondered why the Irish rail system has such a bad reputation. We sat down with Alan Fernihough (Queen’s University Belfast) to discuss the history of Irish rail transport and answer once and for all why there is no train to Donegal.
Link to paper: https://ceph.ie/article-re/transport-infrastructure-and-the-irish-economy/
Link to map: https://ceph.ie/data-set/data-set-1/
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 6: What was South Africa’s Long Walk to Economic Freedom? With Johan Fourie
Africa is the cradle of civilisation, yet only recently have scholars acknowledged its importance in modern research. What can we learn about economic history from the African experience? And have you ever wondered what economics has to do with Settlers of Catan? Join Andrew and Lloyd as they talk to Johan Fourie (Stellenbosch University) as they talk about his book ‘Our Long Walk to Economic Freedom’.
Link to book: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/our-long-walk-to-economic-freedom/0985F9390A3B26B40DE0AC6BC1111414
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 5: Why is Crypto nothing new? With John Turner and William Quinn
Have you ever wondered why so many people get sucked into novel and volatile investments such as cryptocurrency? John Andrew and Lloyd as they sit down with another double-act, John Turner and William Quinn (both Queen’s University Belfast), authors of Boom and Bust. They discuss bubbles, how they come to pass, and the outcomes (positive and negative) once they burst.
Links to book:
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 4: Why do rebels rebel? With Gaia Narciso
People take up arms for any number of reasons, but how far back do they go? Is it possible that the Irish Famine prompted participation in the Irish War of Independence? Join Andrew and Lloyd as they sit down with Gaia Narciso (Trinity College Dublin) to discuss long-run impacts and what wind can tell us about your likelihood to join a rebellion.
Link to paper: https://ceph.ie/article-re/the-deep-roots-of-rebellion/
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 3: What is Economic Nationalism? With Marvin Suesse
Nationalism is on the rise, but this is nothing new. What are the economic consequences that we can expect from this? Marvin Suesse (Trinity College Dublin) explains ‘the Nationalist Dilemma’ to Andrew and Lloyd, based on his new book which is available now.
Links to book:
- https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/nationalist-dilemma/7C3C68EA9C049E34CCF82526FD3CF7F9
- https://www.amazon.co.uk/Nationalist-Dilemma-Economic-Nationalism-1776-Present/dp/1108831389
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 2: Why didn’t wages change in London for one hundred years? With Judy Stephenson
You would think that generations of workers in seventeenth and eighteenth century London might want a payrise, yet many were paid a fixed wage across their entire working career. Why was this the case? And what can we learn about labour economics and movements from the craftsmen who built St. Paul’s Cathedral? Andrew and Lloyd chat with Judy Stephenson (University College London) about all things early-modern in this discussion of labour and wages in eighteenth-century Britain.
Listen to the episode: HERE.
Season 1, Episode 1: Why can’t Lloyd and Andrew buy a house? With Ronan Lyons
The Irish housing market seems, at first glance, completely impenetrable. To try to unpick the past and present, Ronan Lyons (Trinity College Dublin) joins Andrew and Lloyd to talk through his latest paper about social housing, and Irish housing more broadly.
Link to paper: https://ceph.ie/article-re/social-housing-and-the-spread-of-population-evidence-from-twentieth-century-ireland/
Listen to the episode: HERE.
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