THEORY AND EMPIRICAL PERFORMANCE.
Economic Paradigm and performance in the long run (18th to 21th century):
To what extent are European development-theories on industrialization valid from a World point of view?

One of the major issues of economic history has been theories of industrialization and development. Most of them have been suggested during the 1950s and 1960s by authors such as K. Polanyi (1944), A. Gerschenkron (1952), W. W. Rostow (1960) or Raymond Aron (1963), all with the claim of a world-wide reach. The second issue these theories have in common is their “European” origin (“Europe” defined as Europe plus its Anglo-Saxon offshoots, such as the USA, Australia, etc.). There are at least four good reasons to re-visit these theories: During the ca. 50 years, which have elapsed since their publication, many former developing countries today count into the well-advanced or even the developed ones. Here we mention only Brazil, China, India, South Africa, South Korea, Spain or Turkey.

Former predictions will be evaluated in the light of real development.
1.1/ Earlier theories claimed world-wide reach, but Geert Hofstede and others showed that identical incentives lead to different reactions in different cultures. Thus: can non-European development be sufficiently explained by European-based theory?
1.2/ The theories are of above all macro-economic character, while our approach is primarily microeconomic oriented. We ask actor-based about performance of countries.
1.3/ The combination of contributions from developed and newly developed countries may lead to the demand for a non-European based theory on development or underline the validity of the existing ones – including all variations in between these two possibilities.

Format:
In order to prepare the session, we have scheduled the following four pre-conferences:
2.1/Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, August 17th and 18th, 2017 at Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Local organizer: Luiz Carlo Delorme Prado, Professor, IE-UFRJ, Institute of Economics, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
2.2/ Beijing, China, October 21st & 22nd, 2017 at Renmin University of China. Local organizer: Huang Chun and Wang Jüe, both of Renmin University of China
2.3/ Tokyo, Japan, November 15th & 16th, 2017 at Waseda University. Local organizer: Yago Kazuhiko, Waseda University.
2.4/ Paris, France, March 29th, 2018 at Académie des Sciences d’ Outre-Mer with the support of the University Paris – Sorbonne (Paris IV) and the CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research). Local organizer: Dominique Barjot, University Paris – Sorbonne (Paris IV)

This panel will follow a standard format (180’), with a general report issued of the four preparatory conferences (15 to 20’), nine papers and two discussants. If possible, the papers will be pre-circulated. Each panelist will have 10 minutes for presentation. The presentation of different papers will be followed by a general discussion and Q&A (70’) including a brief intervention of other organizers than D. Barjot and H. G. Schroter. We plan to have papers on port cities of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans and of the Mediterranean and other seas. Each paper will explore one or more issues/inquiries outlined above with an overall objective to develop a global comparative perspective.