Practice question · Multiple choice
Pomeranz argues that around 1750 the Yangzi delta and England had comparable living standards. If divergence was not inherent to domestic institutions, what follows for explanations of Europe's subsequent economic leap?
Hints
- Does the Great Divergence thesis treat industrialisation as an internal cultural inevitability or an ecological contingency?
- What specific physical windfalls relieved England's land constraints relative to the Yangzi delta?
Show the answer
D. Coal and colonial resources broke local ecological bottlenecks
Why
Treating institutional superiority or ancient productivity advantages as inevitable mistranslates a contingent ecological breakthrough into permanent civilisational divergence. Windfalls of coal and colonial trade relieved land pressures that constrained other advanced regions.
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