A Free Nation Deep in Debt

by MacDonald, James

• ISBN13: 9780691126326
• ISBN10: 0691126321
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-05-02
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr

Summary

For the greater part of recorded history the most successful and powerful states were autocracies; yet now the world is increasingly dominated by democracies. InA Free Nation Deep in Debt, James Macdonald provides a novel answer for how and why this political transformation occurred. The pressures of war finance led ancient states to store up treasure; and treasure accumulation invariably favored autocratic states. But when the art of public borrowing was developed by the city-states of medieval Italy as a democratic alternative to the treasure chest, the balance of power tipped. From that point on, the pressures of war favored states with the greatest public creditworthiness; and the most creditworthy states were invariably those in which the people who provided the money also controlled the government. Democracy had found a secret weapon and the era of the citizen creditor was born. Macdonald unfolds this tale in a sweeping history that starts in biblical times, passes via medieval Italy to the wars and revolutions of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and ends with the great bond drives that financed the two world wars.

Table of Contents

Introduction: THE FINANCIAL ROOTS OF DEMOCRACY	3	(7)
1. TRIBES AND EMPIRES	10	(57)
Rags to Riches	10	(8)
Barbarians at the Gate	18	(6)
The Free Men Fight Back	24	(7)
Greeks and Their "Gifts"	31	(5)
Civic Debt	36	(6)
Kings and Tyrants	42	(3)
The Carthaginian Wars	45	(6)
Imperium Romanum	51	(5)
Breakdown	56	(11)
2. CITIZEN CREDITORS	67	(38)
The Return of the City-State	67	(5)
La Serenissima	72	(5)
La Superba	77	(4)
The Monte Comune	81	(3)
The Twilight of Repayable Taxes	84	(10)
San Giorgio	94	(6)
Selfish Citizens	100	(5)
3. SOVEREIGN DEBT	105	(43)
Kings and Merchants	105	(10)
The Treasure of the Indies	115	(7)
Antwerp and Lyons	122	(6)
Serial Bankruptcy	128	(10)
Folie des Offices	138	(10)
4. RESISTANCE TO THE HEGEMON	148	(31)
The League of Cities	148	(9)
Regicide	157	(9)
Glorious Revolution	166	(13)
5. THE CHIMERA	179	(41)
Le Roi Soleil	179	(6)
Post-bellum Depression	185	(5)
The Chimera	190	(15)
The Bubble	205	(15)
6. THE DILEMMA	220	(52)
Mopping Up	221	(6)
The Ruling Class	227	(12)
The Dilemma	239	(16)
The Limits of Absolutism	255	(11)
Aristocratic Revolution	266	(6)
7. REVOLUTION	272	(75)
A New World	277	(12)
The First and Second American Revolutions	289	(18)
Enemies of the People	307	(27)
The Elephant and the Whale	334	(13)
8. BOURGEOIS CENTURY	347	(53)
Pax Britannica	348	(7)
The Heyday of Bourgeois Finance	355	(11)
Ties of Identity	366	(11)
A Nation of Rentiers	377	(7)
Greenbacks and 5-20's	384	(16)
9. NATIONS AT ARMS	400	(65)
Total War (Part I)	400	(13)
The Settlement of Accounts (Part I)	413	(22)
Total War (Part II)	435	(10)
Totalitarian War	445	(11)
The Settlement of Accounts (Part II)	456	(9)
Epilogue: THE END OF THE AFFAIR	465	(12)
A Note on Currencies	477	(6)
Glossary	483	(4)
Notes	487	(36)
Bibliography	523	(22)
Acknowledgments	545	(2)
Index	547