Found this on another board, looked up the links, and thought it was worth posting for some here. Problems in Modeling Complex Dynamic interactions: The Political Realignment of the 1850s http://www.nber.org/papers/h0012 http://www.nber.org/papers/h0034 American Economic Development in Historical Perspective : Thomas Weiss : 9780804720847 https://www.bookdepository.com/Amer...orical-Perspective-Thomas-Weiss/9780804720847 ... for those who like academic papers on economic and political economy history and the root causes of the war. Problems in Modeling Complex Dynamic interactions: The Political Realignment of the 1850s Robert W. Fogel The aim of this paper is to break open the stochastic component of a maj or political change and to show that what seems like the product of purely chance events is the particular conjunction of processes, each of which is definable in a systematic way, that provide collectively a favorable context in which purely chance events operate. It is only in a particular context that the purely chance events became decisive in bringing about a particular political outcome. Section 1 emphasizes that Lincoln's margin of victory in 1860 was so small that anyone of numerous chance events could have resulted in his defeat. Sections 2-4 outline the intergenerational, cohort, and period changes and events that created a context favorable for the political realignment of the l850s. Section 5 describes the key chance events of 1855 -1856, the absence of any of which could have prevented the formation of a major national Republican party in 1856, as well as the chance (or at least exogenous) events of 1857-1859, the absence of which could have led to splits in the Republican party that would have insured the victory of a proslavery candidate for the Presidency in 1860. Section 6 deals with the problems and advantages of turning the theory of the political realignment of the l850s implicit in sections 2-5 into an explicit, testable mathematical model. Section 7 explains why it is impossible to produce a general theory of political realignments that would have significant predictive power. One flaw in the narrative is he leaves out the fact that the Republicans ran different campaigns in different regions, and how that plays out; the campaigns in the East were in some cases contradictions of those run in the Midwest, their stronghold as a regional Party, but the paper is bound to be interesting to history buffs. It's also included in this book: American Economic Development in Historical Perspective : Thomas Weiss : 9780804720847 The book is in three parts.The first set of essays deals with the meaning and measurement of economic growth and development: economic growth during the antebellum period; the long-term behavior of such financial variables as stock and bond yields and the savings rate; immigration to the United States during the 1850's; and the juxtaposition of economic history and development. The second group of essays examines the influence of institutional changes on American economic growth: the importance of ideas, ideologies, and institutions in sustaining growth; seasonality in labor markets; risk sharing, crew quality, labor shares, and wages in the whaling industry; and capital formation in midwest farms and industries. The essays of the third section analyze events in the political economy of U.S. development: the role of economic issues in the political realignment that led to the election of Abraham Lincoln; the effect of the Civil War on the economic fortunes of Philadelphia's entrepreneurs; the effect of the silver movement on price stability; and the growth and triumph of oligopoly The essay in the book doesn't match the one at NBER exactly, but it's close enough, and of course the book has several more essays on American economic development, including a good one on 19th Century labor gains and losses. A lot of history in these even if you don't like the academic formulas and theories.
