Frank-Landes Debate, Page 4
William Fowler: I don't really want you to stop, but I, my job requires me to do that. As you can see, we're likely to have a bit of intellectual heat this afternoon and an equal amount of light, I think. Let me remind you of the format. I will ask the questions, I will read the questions. All of these questions have been seen by the participants in advance. The person responding to the question will have seven minutes to respond. When he has finished, the person who asked the question will also have seven minutes and so the first question is from Professor Landes to Professor Frank.
“Question 1: Biggest question. How to account for European/Western performance. The question is, and this is a quote from Professor Frank's book, the question is: How and why, beginning around 1800, Europe, and then the United States, after long lagging behind, suddenly caught up, and then overtook Asian economically and politically in one world economy and system? end quote. Suddenly?!?!? Exclamation marks!!!! Question mark!!!!” Professor Landes to Professor Frank.
Andre Gunder Frank: Now, I'm supposed to follow that?
David Landes: I speak first or you speak first?
William Fowler: No, no... Professor Frank gets to speak first.
David Landes: Okay. Oh, you speak. Okay.
Andre Gunder Frank: Two years before David published his Prometheus book, eminent economic historian by the name of Hartwell wrote a book on the industrial revolution and observed that in 1910 already, his eminent predecessor, Clapham had observed, in turn, that the industrial revolution already in 1910 was a thrice, three times squeezed orange that was still giving a lot of juice. And by the time Hartwell wrote in the mid-60's, it gave, it still gave some juice but Hartwell listed reasons from soup to nuts as to why that happened with industrial revolution and the rise of the West, but that nobody could agree on any of these reasons and Hartwell added the real question is to ask whether the reasons were endogenous or exogenous, by exogenous he said in parentheses, like external economic pressures. Then came David with his `69 book that shows among some of the reasons that Hartwell and Clapham had already raised and then he still does that in this book. The point, however, is that already then and still now, David is trying no longer just to squeeze an orange but to essentially to squeeze blood out of a stone that is absolutely dry and can yield no more for a series of reasons. First of all, the British orange has already been converted into marmalade for over a century after Clapham when it had virtually squeezed dry in the century before so there isn't anything left to get there. Secondly, the issue really is to compare the British Orange with the Chinese orange and all the other oranges according to some. And you do that to a little extent not very well, because you don't look very far beyond Europe as to what actually happened. My argument is that what really needs to be done and nobody has ever tried to do that to my knowledge except the timid attempt by Gunder Frank to begin to do so which is to study the entire world orange grove and start squeezing that instead of continuing to squeeze only the British orange. And to see how it is that the entire world economic orange grove influences what happened in any of its parts including, in particular, the European part. Secondly, that it is essential to not only look at what happened after 1800 and to relate it to the alleged thousand or eight-hundred years of history before that that allegedly, suddenly, or you say, not suddenly. Let me start again. Our difference on this is two-fold. First of all, you say that the change was not sudden, but a thousand years of development or more. Therefore, you deny the very basis of what needs to be explained because you say that's not what happened; therefore, we don't have to explain it. I say we do have to explain it because until 1800, Asia was vastly ahead of Europe and all the data that we have show that, despite your denial of them. So that we do have to explain why there was a change after 1800, now it's possible that the change after 1800 could be explained in some way by some characteristics that preexisted, but it's very unlikely. I'll give you an argument that you, yourself, did not make, which would vastly strengthen your own argument, which is might be called the dinosaur/mammal argument. Mammals had certain characteristics at the time that the dinosaurs reigned which turned out to become of some use, of some survival value and even to be developable, and that had to be developed after the dinosaurs died out. In that sense, it may be that there was something before 1800 in Europe which became of some relevance after 1800, after, essentially, the Asian competition went down. But you cannot explain the change from 1800 as long as you remain like David Landes in the age of the dinosaurs. What I do instead with all this preamble now, I cannot explain it, but maybe in the next question, I will, is to try to show how it is a world economic conjuncture that through comparative factor prices and scarcities made it suddenly necessary and possible for the Europeans to invest in labor saving and power generating technology that resulted in the industrial revolution, while it was not in the interest of the others to do so, that this was a new event and incidentally, to make one small reference to your opening statement, Adam Smith and so forth. Adam Smith was writing in 1776 and he had no notion, none, that you can find in his book, that he was aware that he was living at the beginning of the industrial revolution. Neither did Malthus, that's why he invented the Malthusian theory, neither did Ricardo, none of these people were aware of what you claim has been obvious for a thousand years. Well, why weren't they aware? Because this really was a new phenomenon which we have to explain in terms that are totally un-Landesian and that are derived from an economic and, if you wish, also political and so forth... analysis of the world economy and what it was in the world economy that produced this industrial revolution in that marginal outpost as you rightly call it. And that's what Gunder Frank tries to do and that's what Landes doesn't try to do, in fact, because he says that's not even the issue. But that is the issue.
William Fowler: Thank you. Professor Landes, seven minutes please.
David Landes: Okay. Yes. Just a footnote, I think Hartwell came out in `71.
Andre Gunder Frank: My addition is `67, but okay, maybe it's `71.
David Landes: Well, in your book it's `71, okay?
Andre Gunder Frank: It doesn't matter. Okay.
David Landes: Okay. I mean, I really trust your bibliography, okay? No because you say Hartwell and then I. Actually, I had spoken to Hartwell about some of these things. Anyway, squeezing oranges. You have to squeeze all the oranges in the world, the entire world orange grove.
Andre Gunder Frank: `71, you are so right.
David Landes: I got it from you.
Andre Gunder Frank: Yeah, well trust what I write, not what I say.
David Landes: Yeah, okay.
Andre Gunder Frank: Do as I do, not as I say.
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