The Role of Institutional Influences in Patterns of Agricultural Development in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: A Cross-Section Quantitative Study

In this paper we stratify a sample of 24 countries by the role of agriculture in industrial growth in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and focus on systematic differences in the nature and strength of the interactions of institutional with agricultural and industrial change. A novel technique, disjoint principal components models, is applied to categorized data representing 35 facets of social, economic, and political structure and institutions. The results stress the systematic variations in the impact of land institutions among countries with different levels and structures of development. They also underline the critical role of social and political forces in differentiating among paths of economic change. Finally, they highlight the need for cross-section studies using institutional data to understand better the complexity of institutional constraints and influences which often vary little in a given national environment.