Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY AND SOURCES
P
REFACE
Mohamed 
ElBaradei’s 
views 
can 
be 
found 
at
twitter.com/#!/ElBaradei
.
Mosaab El Shami and Noha Hamed quotes are from Yahoo! news
2/6/2011, at 
news.yahoo.com/s/
yblog_exclusive/20110206/ts_yblog_exclusive/
egyptian-voices-from-tahrir-square
.
On the twelve immediate demands posted on Wael Khalil’s blog,
see 
alethonews.wordpress.com/2011/02/27/egypt-reviewing-the-
demands/
.
Reda Metwaly is quoted on Al Jazeera, 2/1/2011, at
english.aljazeera.net/news/
middleeast/2011/02/2011212597913527.html
.

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C
HAPTER
 1 : So C
LOSE AND
 Y
ET
 S
O
 D
IFFERENT
A good discussion of the Spanish exploration of the Rio de La Plata
is Rock (1992), chap. 1. On the discovery and colonization of the
Guaraní, see Ganson (2003). The quotations from de Sahagún are
from de Sahagún (1975), pp. 47–49. Gibson (1963) is fundamental on
the Spanish conquest of Mexico and the institutions they structured.
The quotations from de las Casas come from de las Casas (1992), pp.
39, 117–18, and 107, respectively.
On Pizarro in Peru, see Hemming (1983). Chaps. 1–6 cover the
meeting at Cajamarca and the march south and the capture of the
Inca capital, Cuzco. See Hemming (1983), chap. 20, on de Toledo.
Bakewell (1984) gives an overview of the functioning of the Potosí
mita, and Dell (2010) provides statistical evidence that shows how it
has had persistent effects over time.
The quote from Arthur Young is reproduced from Sheridan (1973),
p. 8. There are many good books that describe the early history of
Jamestown: for example, Price (2003), and Kupperman (2007). Our
treatment is heavily influenced by Morgan (1975) and Galenson
(1996). The quote from Anas Todkill comes from p. 38 of Todkill
(1885). The quotes from John Smith are from Price (2003), p. 77
(“Victuals …”), p. 93 (“If your king …”), and p. 96 (“When you
send …”). The Charter of Maryland, the Fundamental Constitutions of
Carolina, and other colonial constitutions have been put on the
Internet 
by 
Yale 
University’s 
Avalon 
Project, 
at
avalon.law.yale.edu/17th_century
.
Bakewell (2009), chap. 14, discusses the independence of Mexico
and the constitution. See Stevens (1991) and Knight (2011) on
postindependence political instability and presidents. Coatsworth
(1978) is the seminal paper on the evidence on economic decline in
Mexico after independence. Haber (2010) presents the comparison of
the development of banking in Mexico and the United States. Sokoloff
(1988) and Sokoloff and Khan (1990) provide evidence on the social
background of innovators in the United States who filed patents. See

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Israel (2000) for a biography of Thomas Edison. Haber, Maurer, and
Razo (2003) proposes an interpretation of the political economy of
the regime of Porfirio Díaz very much in the spirit of our discussion.
Haber, Klein, Maurer, and Middlebrook (2008) extend this treatment
of Mexico’s political economy into the twentieth century. On the
differential allocation of frontier lands in North and Latin America,
see Nugent and Robinson (2010) and García-Jimeno and Robinson
(2011). Hu-DeHart (1984) discusses the deportation of the Yaqui
people in chap. 6. On the fortune of Carlos Slim and how it was
made, see Relea (2007) and Martinez (2002).
Our interpretation of comparative economic development of the
Americas builds on our own previous research with Simon Johnson,