AbstractRecently, new research has challenged the traditional narrative; Spain did not suffer from a ruler that threatened his subjects’ property with excessive taxes and forced loans. Instead, Spanish economic development was held back by decentralised and non-predatory governance, unable to solve the coordination problems blocking the way to more integrated markets. Through the analysis of the governance and loan portfolios of an ecclesiastical order, this paper examines the extent to which mortgage credit markets were fragmented in early modern Spain. This order not only collected resources that it subsequently lent but also pooled them. Indeed, it developed into a nationally integrated organisation able to offer everything from small loans to farmers to substantial amounts to the king and the Madrid elite.
Informal credit markets and economic development in Taiwan