The course presents a survey of major developments in world economic history and economic thought from about 1500 to today and arranged around the theme of ‘winners' and ‘losers'. It examines why the West triumphed in the early modern period and why at the same time great eastern civilisations such as India and China declined. It covers the West’s adoption of the system of slavery, the industrial revolution that began in Britain and extended to other European countries and the United States, and the development of capitalism. It looks into differences within capitalist countries and between rich capitalist countries and underdeveloped countries in the periphery. The course examines the contest between major economic ideas such as liberalism, comparative advantage and socialist ideas; the causes and consequences of the Great Depression of the 1930s; and the effort led by the United States to reconstruct the non-communist world after World War II. We discuss winners and losers in the Golden Age of capitalism and a world divided between rich western economies, a less prosperous and centrally directed communist bloc and the ’third world’ of under-developed countries. The course then discusses major developments in the late 20th and 21st centuries including the Global Financial Crisis, the rise of China, and the dominance of high technology companies. Finally, the course also pays attention to the question why Australia emerged in the two centuries after 1788 as a prosperous country.
