Insegnamento a.a. 2023-2024

• The First Globalization.
• The (possible) roots of the Great Divergence and the early rise of Europe over Asia.
• The Little Divergence within Europe: North vs South.
• The sources of divergence: social-economic institutions, culture, and demography.
• Long-term trends in economic inequality and in inequality “extraction rates”.
• Large-scale pandemics and inequality
• The Industrial Revolution and the Great Divergence.
• Europe and Asia compared, before and after the Industrial Revolution.
• The short Golden Age of Global Capitalism (1896-1914).
• Who was rich, across the ages?
• World War I: the collapse of the established order.
• World War II: the birth of a new international economy.
• Falling behind: the case of Africa.
• The deepening of inequalities across the world.
• The emergence of a new Global Capitalism in the late twentieth century.
• Recent developments in international and global economic inequality.
• Globalization and Inequality – which connection?
• The social role of the rich, in the long run of history

By the end of the course, the students have acquired knowledge about:

• The long-run trends in divergence/convergence between different world areas.
• The long-run trends in between- and within-country inequality.
• The process leading in time to the emergence of the global economy that we experience today, as well as an understanding of how this differs from earlier historical situations.

The students also have acquired an understanding of the remote and proximate factors which could have led to differences in economic performance across world areas in different phases of human history.

• Identify the specific ways in which given world areas were (and are) affected by globalization and by other large-scale historical processes.
• Identify how history can be used, and how explanatory variables can be selected, to provide non-neutral readings of historical processes (and how to provide counter-arguments to such readings).
• Research the remote and proximate factors leading to differences in economic performance between specific world areas in the long run of history. The students also have tuned their soft skills in a number of areas:
  • Writing of short but impactful texts on broad topics following strict redaction rules.
  • Redaction of a research project in the social sciences.
  • Presentation in public of reports/projects in different conditions (low/high time constraints, etc.).
  • Team-building and cooperation on common projects.

• Face-to-face lectures
• Guest speaker's talks (in class or in distance)
• Individual assignments
• Group assignments

The course includes engaging lectures, to which students are required to contribute by providing their opinions and answering questions in class.

• During the course, two guests are invited to deliver lectures building upon their own research in areas relevant to the course.
• An optional individual assignement ("Descriptive Report") covers the specific path of economic development, in the context of the Great Divergence, followed by a world area chosen by the student.
• The group assignement consists in the redaction and presentation in class of a "Research Project" on a topic relevant to the course.

Assessment is based on two elements:

1. First element:
   • A partial written exam on the first part of the course and another partial written exam on the second part of the course. OR
   • A written exam on the full program for attending students (selected chapters and teaching material on LS).
2. Second element:
   • A written group project on a topic agreed upon with the instructor & its presentation in class.
3. To these two elements, an optional individual "Descriptive Report" can be added (focused on the long-term economic development of a specific world area).

A written exam on the books and the teaching material on Bboard, including the slide packages for each lecture and the additional compulsory readings which are specified in the detailed syllabus uploaded on Bboard as well as in the reading lists for the two parts of the course. In the case of Alfani's book As Gods Among Men and Milanovic's book Worlds Apart, non-attending students are required to cover all the chapters (while attending students have to cover selected chapters only).

• G. ALFANI, As Gods Among Men. A History of the Rich in the West, Princeton University Press 2023 (selected chapters only).
• K. POMERANZ, The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2005 (selected chapters only).
• B. MILANOVIC, Worlds Apart: Measuring International and Global Inequality, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2005 (selected chapters only).
• Additional material provided by the Instructor through Bboard & Course Reserve.

• G. ALFANI, As Gods Among Men. A History of the Rich in the West, Princeton University Press 2023 (ALL CHAPTERS)
• K. POMERANZ, The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2005
• B. MILANOVIC, Worlds Apart: Measuring International and Global Inequality, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2005 (ALL CHAPTERS).
• Additional material provided by the Instructor through Bboard & Course Reserve.