Abstract
California presents an important case of regional capitalism grounded in the wealth of nature. It belies the received wisdom that natural resource extraction is an anachronistic and inferior road to economic development. Prior to World War II, California’s economy rested squarely on minerals, agriculture, timber, and fisheries, yet this was consonant with high income, capital accumulation, development of manufacturing, and a high rate of technical innovation. Indeed, the latter were crucial to an extraordinarily rapid rate of discovery and plunder of resources for over a century. With due regard to the gifts of nature, the secret of California’s success is to be found in its social relations of production, especially open property rights and a syncretic class system, rapid capital accumulation, and a redoubtable state based firmly on the capitalist society that crafted it.
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