Assessing different historical pathways in the cultural evolution of economic development.

ABSTRACT: A huge number of hypotheses have been put forward to explain the substantial diversity in economic performance we see in the present-day. There has been a growing appreciation that historical and ecological factors have contributed to social and economic development. However, it is not clear whether such factors have exerted a direct effect on modern productivity, or whether they influence economies indirectly by shaping the cultural evolution of norms and institutions. Here we analyse a global cross-national dataset to test between hypotheses involving a number of different ecological, historical, and proximate social factors and a range of direct and indirect pathways. We show that the historical timing of agriculture predicts the timing of the emergence of statehood, which in turn affec

SUBMITTER: Flitton A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8785121 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature