Table Of ContentThis book makes the connection between European agricultural history and the
experience of developing countries, and shows how fascinating, informative and
revealing the linkage can be.
Dr Paul Brassley, Centre for Rural Policy Research,
University of Exeter, UK
Too few academics attempt to fill the gaps between disciplines. Jonathan
Harwood sheds light on the potential for a second generation Green Revolution
to improve the lives of small farmers in developing countries by appealing to the
history of plant breeding in nineteenth and early twentieth century Europe.
Carrie A. Meyer, Associate Professor of Economics,
George Mason University, USA
Europe’s Green Revolution and
Others Since
How poverty and hunger in the developing world can be alleviated is an issue
which has preoccupied development experts and politicians since 1945. Success,
however, has been limited. The well-k nown post- war ‘Green Revolution’ pro-
grammes managed to increase grain production substantially in Latin America
and South Asia, but by 1970 critics were arguing that they had made little impact
upon rural poverty because the agricultural technology introduced was better
suited to large commercial farms than to small subsistence ones. From the 1970s
onward it seemed as though this criticism would bear fruit as experts developed
a number of new approaches to cultivation which were tailored to the needs of
peasant farmers. But levels of rural poverty and malnutrition remain very high,
prompting major development agencies in recent years to urge that more atten-
tion be given to the plight of small farmers.
From a European perspective this persistent failure to develop a technology
suitable for smallholders is puzzling. From the late nineteenth century, for
example, various European countries also underwent ‘green revolutions’
designed to boost agricultural productivity, and several states established plant-
breeding stations whose express purpose was to serve the needs of peasant
farmers. Some of these stations were very successful, making a substantial
impact upon the regional economies they served.
Remarkably, however, this European episode is virtually unknown among
development experts today. Indeed, since 1945 the development industry, despite
struggling to make an impact upon poverty, has displayed an astonishing lack of
interest in the success or failure of past development projects. After telling the
story of Europe’s peasant-f riendly approach to agriculture and tracing the history
of Green Revolutions since 1945, this book argues that state-f unded agricultural
research has the potential to make a large impact upon poverty in the developing
world but is unlikely to do so as long as the development industry continues to
ignore its past.
Jonathan Harwood is Emeritus Professor of the History of Science and Tech-
nology at the University of Manchester, UK.
Routledge explorations in economic history
Edited by Lars Magnusson
Uppsala University, Sweden
1 Economic Ideas and 7 Production Efficiency in
Government Policy Domesday England, 1086
Contributions to contemporary John McDonald
economic history
8 Free Trade and its Reception
Sir Alec Cairncross
1815–1960
Freedom and trade: Volume I
2 The Organization of Labour
Edited by Andrew Marrison
Markets
Modernity, culture and
9 Conceiving Companies
governance in Germany, Sweden,
Joint- stock politics in Victorian
Britain and Japan
England
Bo Stråth
Timothy L. Alborn
3 Currency Convertibility 10 The British Industrial Decline
The gold standard and beyond Reconsidered
Edited by Jorge Braga de Macedo, Edited by Jean-P ierre Dormois
Barry Eichengreen and Jaime Reis and Michael Dintenfass
11 The Conservatives and
4 Britain’s Place in the World
Industrial Efficiency, 1951–1964
A historical enquiry into import
Thirteen wasted years?
controls 1945–1960
Nick Tiratsoo and Jim Tomlinson
Alan S. Milward and
George Brennan
12 Pacific Centuries
Pacific and Pacific Rim history
5 France and the International
since the sixteenth century
Economy
Edited by Dennis O. Flynn,
From Vichy to the Treaty of Rome
Lionel Frost and A. J. H. Latham
Frances M. B. Lynch
13 The Premodern Chinese
6 Monetary Standards and Economy
Exchange Rates Structural equilibrium and
M. C. Marcuzzo, L. Officer and capitalist sterility
A. Rosselli Gang Deng
14 The Role of Banks in 23 The Origins of National
Monitoring Firms Financial Systems
The Case of the Crédit Mobilier Alexander Gerschenkron
Elisabeth Paulet reconsidered
Edited by Douglas J. Forsyth and
15 Management of the National Daniel Verdier
Debt in the United Kingdom,
1900–1932 24 The Russian Revolutionary
Jeremy Wormell Economy, 1890–1940
Ideas, debates and alternatives
16 An Economic History of Sweden Vincent Barnett
Lars Magnusson
25 Land Rights, Ethno Nationality
17 Freedom and Growth and Sovereignty in History
The rise of states and markets in Edited by Stanley L. Engerman
Europe, 1300–1750 and Jacob Metzer
S. R. Epstein
26 An Economic History of Film
18 The Mediterranean Response to Edited by John Sedgwick and
Globalization Before 1950 Mike Pokorny
Sevket Pamuk and
Jeffrey G. Williamson 27 The Foreign Exchange Market
of London
19 Production and Consumption in Development since 1900
English Households 1600–1750 John Atkin
Mark Overton, Jane Whittle,
Darron Dean and Andrew Hann 28 Rethinking Economic Change in
India
20 Governance, The State, Labour and livelihood
Regulation and Industrial Tirthankar Roy
Relations
Ian Clark 29 The Mechanics of Modernity in
Europe and East Asia
21 Early Modern Capitalism The institutional origins of social
Economic and social change in change and stagnation
Europe 1400–1800 Erik Ringmar
Edited by Maarten Prak
30 International Economic
22 An Economic History of Integration in Historical
London, 1800–1914 Perspective
Michael Ball and Dennis M. P. McCarthy
David Sunderland
31 Theories of International Trade 40 Quantitative Economic History
Adam Klug The good of counting
Edited by Warren Young and Edited by Joshua Rosenbloom
Michael Bordo
41 A History of Macroeconomic
32 Classical Trade Protectionism Policy in the United States
1815–1914 John H. Wood
Edited by Jean Pierre Dormois
and Pedro Lains 42 An Economic History of the
American Steel Industry
33 Economy and Economics of Robert P. Rogers
Ancient Greece
Takeshi Amemiya 43 Ireland and the Industrial
Revolution
34 Social Capital, Trust and the
The impact of the Industrial
Industrial Revolution:
Revolution on Irish industry and
1780–1880
society, 1801–1922
David Sunderland
Andy Bielenberg
35 Pricing Theory, Financing of
44 Intra- Asian Trade and
International Organisations and
Industrialization
Monetary History
Essays in memory of
Lawrence H. Officer
Yasukichi Yasuba
Edited by A. J. H. Latham and
36 Political Competition and
Heita Kawakatsu
Economic Regulation
Edited by Peter Bernholz and
45 Nation, State and the Industrial
Roland Vaubel
Revolution
37 Industrial Development in The visible hand
Postwar Japan Lars Magnusson
Hirohisa Kohama
46 A Cultural History of Finance
38 Reflections on the Cliometrics Irene Finel-H onigman
Revolution
Conversations with economic 47 Managing Crises and
historians De- globalisation
Edited by John S. Lyons, Nordic foreign trade and exchange
Louis P. Cain, and 1919–1939
Samuel H. Williamson Edited by Sven-O lof Olsson
39 Agriculture and Economic 48 The International Tin Cartel
Development in Europe Since John Hillman
1870
Edited by Pedro Lains and 49 The South Sea Bubble
Vicente Pinilla Helen J. Paul
50 Ideas and Economic Crises in 54 An Economic History of Modern
Britain from Attlee to Blair Sweden
(1945–2005) Lennart Schön
Matthias Matthijs
55 The Standard of Living and
51 Bengal Industries and the Revolutions in Russia,
British Industrial Revolution 1700–1917
(1757–1857) Boris Mironov
Indrajit Ray
56 Europe’s Green Revolution and
52 The Evolving Structure of the Others Since
East Asian Economic System The rise and fall of peasant-
since 1700 friendly plant breeding
Edited by A. J. H. Latham and Jonathan Harwood
Heita Kawakatsu
53 The Rise of Planning in
Industrial America, 1865–1914
Richard Adelstein
For H.I.H. (who was patient)
Europe’s Green Revolution
and Others Since
The rise and fall of peasant-f riendly
plant breeding
Jonathan Harwood
