Democracy, Autocracy and Sovereign Debt

18 December 2023

This project was supported by the British Academy Newton Fund (2016-20). It was jointly run by Prof Coşkun Tunçer (University College London) and Dr Leonardo Weller (Fundação Getúlio Vargas). The main research question of this project is how political systems influenced the way peripheral governments managed their debt in the first financial globalization, from c. 1870 to 1914. The project approached this by studying a number of case studies that mix different political regimes and debt records. The main research output of the project was a co-authored article that formally tested the democratic advantage thesis in the context of the first financial globalization.

As part of the project, two international workshops were organised in London and São Paulo. The working papers presented in these workshops can be downloaded here.

Workshops

São Paulo: 21-22 August 2017

London: 6-7 June 2018

Boston: 29 July - 3 August 2018

Panel at the World Economic History Congress

Working Papers

An economic history perspective on sovereign debt: a collateral story by Larry Neal.
When is Debt Odious? Brazil and the Portuguese Loan of 1823 by William Summerhill.
A Portuguese Twist? Sovereign Debt Management in an Emerging Country, 1869‐1890 by Rui P. Esteves.
Democracy, Autocracy and Sovereign Debt: How Polity Influenced Country Risk in the First Financial Globalisation by Coskun Tuncer and Leonardo Weller.
Constitutionalism and state finances in the Austrian Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, 1815-1914 by Michael Pammer.
Emerging Financial Markets of the 1820s: Latin American Sovereign Debt, 1825-1852 by Gail D. Triner.
Greece in a Monetary Union: Lessons from 100 Years of Exchange-Rate Experience by Matthias Morys.
Scotland, Ireland, and the taxing Unions of 1707 and 1801 by Julian Hoppit.
From federalism to centralism: local finances in Cundinamarca, Colombia 1872-1910 by Edwin López Rivera.
Placing Contemporary Sovereign Debt: The Fragmented Landscape of Legal Precedent and Legislative Preemption by Giselle Datz.
Can Europe Run Greece? Lessons from U.S. Fiscal Receiverships in Latin America, 1904-31 by Noel Maurer and Leticia Arroyo Abad.
Royal credible commitment and the partial default of the Swedish Diet in 1719 by Peter Ericsson and Patrik Winton.
Why did people pay taxes? Fiscal innovation in Portugal and state making in times of political struggle (1500-1680) by Leonor Freire Costa and Paulo Brito.
Economic Consequences of Anarchy; Legal and fiscal capacities of the Polish state and their impact on market integration, 1505-1772 by Mikolaj Malinowski.
A Never-Ending Story: Public Debt and the Italian Banking Question from the Restoration to National Unification (1814-74) by Maria Stella Chiaruttini.
Local spending, taxation and politics in the periphery of Europe: Italy 1861-1938 by Mauro Rota.
Do African budgets finance patronage? Examining public expenditure trends in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, 1960-2010 by Rebecca Simson.
Towards a Modern Fiscal State in Southeast Asia, 1900-60 by Anne Booth.
Three Tax Regimes: Colonial Taxation Policy in Sierra Leone, 1896-1914 by Laura Channing.
Public credit, credibility and confidence in colonial Jamaica, 1664-1865 by Aaron Graham.
The state does not live by warfare alone: State capacity and armed conflict in the long nineteenth century by Agustín Goenaga, Oriol Sabaté and Jan Teorell.
Taking off from Natural Resources: fiscal dependency in comparative perspective by José Peres-Cajías, Sara Torregrosa-Hetland and Cristián Ducoing.
The Legacy of War on Fiscal Capacity by Didac Queralt.
Sovereign Debt and Sovereignty in the Dominican Republic, 1893- 1905 by Cyrus Veeser.
Guiding the Invisible Hand: Multiple Exchange Rates and State Financing in Brazil, 1953-1961 by Bernardo Wjuniski.
Slavery, Fiscal Capacity and Public Goods Provision in Brazil: Evidence from Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, 1836-1912 by Andrea Papadia.