Abstract
Abstract In his editorial introduction to a volume on the economic decline of ancient empires, Carlo Cipolla stresses how the political rigidity of such societies blocked the necessary changes on the supply side: ‘Change hurts vested interests … Conservative people and vested interests cluster around obsolete institutions, and each element supports the other powerfully. Innovating minorities are bound to see their efforts frustrated by this combination.’1 This passage suggests social immobilism—where no group has the resources to force through change against combinations of other interests—an internal balance of power. The idea that blocking coalitions are inimical to growth is common to both the left and the right on standard cases of relative economic decline such as Britain, the US, and the former Soviet Union.2 In this chapter I will attempt to make this idea more precise.
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