The Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions in England and China: A View through the Lens of Dynamic Property Rights Theory

Abstract

This article presents a dynamic land property rights theory based on the law of the limit to land productivity, and then uses this theory and a large amount of data to compare the history of the agricultural and industrial revolutions in England and China. The article finds that, in England, the arable land-especially sown land-per capita of the agricultural population trended downward before the Black Death, but after the Black Death, experienced a long-term upward trend. In China, however, over the same period, the sown area per capita of the rural population shrank. It is these opposing trends that account for the historical divergence between the economies of England and China. This article concludes that the agricultural and industrial revolutions in England, as well as England's capitalist market and private property rights regime, are the result of the expansion of the sown area per capita of the agricultural population. The article also concludes that the claim that England's capitalist system of markets and private property rights gave birth to its agricultural and industrial revolutions cannot be sustained.