What Are Winners And Losers In The 18th Century?

187 Words1 Pages
From David Landes’s book (1999) I chose to review chapter 12 ‘Winners and Losers: The Balance Sheet of Empire’, Abacus, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations, London, pp. 168-185. Firstly, I will explain the reasons behind the decline and rise of some empires in the 18th century, analysing the period between the start of the Age of Discovery and the Industrial Revolution. Further on, I will analyse the influence of Religion: Protestantism in the expansion of Capitalism and Catholicism in the demise of former prosperous economies. The empires that started the Age of Discovery, Spain and Portugal, ended up big losers; they had too much money and instead of saving and investing, they spent it. The Iberian Peninsula didn’t invest in industry or in