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Cultural Factors in Economic Growth

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Thomas C. Cochran
Thomas C. Cochran
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
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Extract

In 1940, when our Association was founded, this paper might have borne the same title as Caroline Ware's book: The Cultural Approach to History. In the meantime, however, world events have brought economists and historians together around the problem of economic growth. So, while pursuing the same interests illustrated in my contribution to Caroline Ware's book, I have chosen the more fashionable title of “Cultural Factors in Economic Growth.”

Type
Cultural Factors in Economic Growth
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , December 1960 , pp. 515 - 530
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1960

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References

1 “The Social History of the Corporation” in Ware, Caroline F., ed., The Cultural Approach to History (New York: Macmillan, 1940), pp. 168–81.Google Scholar

2 Buchanan, Norman S. and Ellis, Howard S., Approaches to Economic Development (New York: Twentieth Century Fund, 1955), p. 405;Google ScholarSocial Science Research Council, Items, XIV, 2 (June 1960), 14.Google Scholar

3 Hirschman, Albert O., The Strategy of Economic Development (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958), p. 25.Google Scholar

4 Ashton, Thomas S., Economic Fluctuations in England 1700–1800 (Oxford University Press, 1959). p. 1.Google Scholar

5 Together with various associates, I have done research in Argentina and Puerto Rico. For Mexico I am relying on the work of Professor John Fayerweather of Columbia University.

6 Spiethoff, Arthur, “Pure Theory and Economic Gestalt Theory, Ideal Types and Real Types,” in Lane, Frederic C. and Riemersma, Jelle C. eds., Enterprise and Secular Change (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1953), p. 452.Google Scholar

7 As quoted in Cochran, Thomas C., The Puerto Rican Businessman (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959), p. 127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 Fayerweather, John, The Executive Overseas (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1959), p. 65.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., p. 96.

10 McClelland, David C., Atkinson, John W., Clark, Russell A., and Lowell, Edgar F., The Achievement Motive (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1953), p. 329.CrossRefGoogle Scholar It is held that “there are limits placed on the development of Achievement by too large discrepancies between expectation and results… If the opportunities are well beyond his capacities, negative affect should result, he may develop an avoidance motive as far as achievement is concerned.” p. 65.

11 Landy, David, Tropical Childhood (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1959), pp. 238ff.Google Scholar

12 Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, p. 26.

13 McClelland, Achievement Motive, p. 329.

14 Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, p. 27.

15 Cochran, Puerto Rican Businessman, p. 121.

16 Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, p. 19.

17 As quoted in Cochran, Puerto Rican Businessman, p. 126.

18 Williams, Richard Hays, ed., Human Factors in Military Operations: Some Application of the Social Sciences to Operations Research (Chevy Chase, Md.: Operations Research Office, The Johns Hopkins University, 1954), pp. 119–20.Google Scholar

19 Hirschman, Strategy of Economic Development, pp. 16–7.

20 As quoted in Cochran, Puerto Rican Businessman, p. 123.

21 Ibid., p. 125.

22 Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, pp. 164–5.

23 Ibid., p. 32.

24 Archives of SIAM DI TELLA LTDA., Buenos Aires, Argentina. The history of SIAM by Thomas C. Cochran and Ruben E. Reina will soon be published by the University of Pennsylvania Press.

25 Charles E. Perkins to Thomas Potter, May 22, 1882, as quoted in Cochran, Thomas C., Railroad Leaders 1845–1890 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953), p. 86.Google Scholar

26 Much of the time the entrepreneur studied in Argentina was used in cementing important friendships. See also Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, p. 70.

27 Vogt, Evon Z., “On the Concepts of Structure and Process in Cultural Anthropology,” American Anthropologist, LXII (Feb. 1960), 266.Google Scholar

28 Lazarsfeld, Paul, “Reflections on Business,” American Journal of Sociology, LXV (July 1959). 17.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., p. 19.

30 Cochran, Puerto Rican Businessman, p. 162.

31 This statement refers only to the period to 1956.

32 Cole, Arthur H., “An Approach to the Study of Entrepreneurship: A Tribute to Edwin F. Gay,” The Journal of Economic History, V, Supplement (1946), 10ff.Google Scholar

33 Social Science Research Council, Items, XIV, 2 (June 1960), 16.Google Scholar

34 Gillin, John, “Ethos Components in Modern Latin American Culture,” American Anthropologist, LVII (1955), 498Google Scholar. The reception pattern in the United States applies only to the more industrialized areas. For example, Texans of the land, cattle, and oil period, or roughly up to 1941, showed very little interest in general technical knowledge. Bankers did not try to learn about industrial risks, and Chambers of Commerce advised industrialists coming to Texas to bring their managers with them. See: Cochran, Thomas C., American Business System (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957), pp. 172ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

35 Cochran, Puerto Rican Businessman, pp. 143–44.

36 Fayerweather, Executive Overseas, p. 20.

37 Ibid., p. 116.

38 Ibid., p. 119.

39 Small businessmen in the United States are also hard to reach with new information, the difference is one of degree.

40 These durables have also altered culture in the developed temperate areas in ways that cannot be discussed here.

41 Since history presents cases of partial and gradual although increasingly successful industrial development, I cannot altogether agree with W. W. Rostow's description of a take-off stage, or with Yusif A. Sayigh's observation that for sustained development an underdeveloped society must accept “the total challenge with its inevitable logic.” Rostow, W. W., The Stages of Economic Growth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960)Google Scholar; Sayigh, Yusif A.“Innovating Enterprise and Development,” Mimeo. for Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, December 17, 1959, p. 3.Google Scholar