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Building Fiscal Capacity in Colonial Mexico: From Fragmentation to Centralization

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  • Arias, Luz Marina

Abstract

The success of fiscal centralization and military buildup in colonial Mexico contrasts with failed similar attempts elsewhere. Why did powerful elites comply with fiscal-military reforms in eighteenth-century Mexico? I argue that the Seven Years' War provided incentives for the Crown to centralize and elites to comply by accentuating the free rider problems inherent in the provision of military defense under fiscal fragmentation. Fiscal data and history document that reforms were more successful in regions more militarily vulnerable and where benefits were more aligned between the elites and the Crown. Centralization served the elites to commit to collective cooperation.

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  • Arias, Luz Marina, 2013. "Building Fiscal Capacity in Colonial Mexico: From Fragmentation to Centralization," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 73(3), pages 662-693, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:73:y:2013:i:03:p:662-693_00
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    As found on the RePEc Biblio, the curated bibliography for Economics:
    1. > Economic History > Regional Economic History > Latin American Economic History > Economic History of Mexico

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    Cited by:

    1. Daniel Sánchez-Piñol Yulee, 2024. "Checkmate: What was a King's worth in nineteenth-century Latin America?," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 35(2), pages 174-199, June.
    2. Libman, A., 2020. "Decentralization of crisis, weakness and responsibility," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 46(2), pages 181-187.
    3. Koyama, Mark & Moriguchi, Chiaki & Sng, Tuan-Hwee, 2018. "Geopolitics and Asia’s little divergence: State building in China and Japan after 1850," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 178-204.
    4. De Magalhaes, Leandro & Giovannoni, Francesco, 2022. "War and the rise of parliaments," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    5. Hector Galindo‐Silva, 2020. "External threats, political turnover, and fiscal capacity," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(3), pages 430-462, November.
    6. Javier L. Arnaut, 2017. "Was Colonialism Fiscally Sustainable? An Empirical Examination of the Colonial Finances of Spanish America," Documentos de Trabajo (DT-AEHE) 1703, Asociación Española de Historia Económica.
    7. Artem Kochnev, 2021. "Marching to Good Laws: The Impact of War, Politics, and International Credit on Reforms in Ukraine," wiiw Working Papers 192, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
    8. Rok Spruk & Mitja Kovac, 2020. "Persistent Effects of Colonial Institutions on Long‐Run Development: Local Evidence from Regression Discontinuity Design in Argentina," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(4), pages 820-861, December.
    9. Alexander F. McQuoid & Yi Ding & Cem Karayalcin, 2017. "Fiscal Federalism, Fiscal Reform, and Economic Growth in China," Departmental Working Papers 57, United States Naval Academy Department of Economics.

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