Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T08:01:56.377Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Collapse of State Power, the Cluniac Reform Movement, and the Origins of Urban Self-Government in Medieval Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2020

Jonathan Stavnskær Doucette Open the ORCID record for Jonathan Stavnskær Doucette [Opens in a new window]  and
Jørgen Møller Open the ORCID record for Jørgen Møller [Opens in a new window]
Get access

Abstract

Several generations of scholarship have identified the medieval development of urban self-government as crucial for European patterns of state formation. However, extant theories, emphasizing structural factors such as initial endowments and warfare, do little to explain the initial emergence of institutions of urban self-government before CE 1200 or why similar institutions did not emerge outside of Europe. We argue that a large-scale collapse of public authority in the ninth and tenth centuries allowed a bottom-up reform movement in West Francia (the Cluniac movement), directed by clergy but with popular backing, to push for ecclesiastical autonomy and asceticism in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. These social realignments, facilitated by new norms about ecclesiastical office holding, stimulated the urban associationalism that led to the initial emergence of autonomous town councils. Using a panel data set of 643 towns in the period between 800 and 1800, we show that medieval towns were substantially more likely to establish autonomous town councils in the period between 1000 and 1200 if they were situated in the vicinity of Cluniac monasteries. These findings are corroborated by regressions that use distance from Cluny—the movement's place of origin—to instrument for proximity to Cluniac monasteries.

Keywords

State collapseurban agglomerationwarfareurban self-governmentCluniac reformsGregorian reformsmonasteriesbishopsmedieval Europe
Type
Research Note
Information
International Organization , Volume 75 , Issue 1 , Winter 2021 , pp. 204 - 223
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abramson, Scott, and Boix, Carles. 2019. Endogenous Parliaments: The Domestic and International Roots of Long-Term Economic Growth and Executive Constraints in Europe. International Organization 73 (4):793–837.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartlett, Robert. 1993. The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization and Cultural Change 950–1350. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Becker, Sascha, Ferrara, Andreas, Melander, Eric, and Pascali, Luigi. 2018. Wars, Local Political Institutions, and Fiscal Capacity: Evidence from Six Centuries of German History. CAGE Working Paper Series, 395.Google Scholar
Bellin, Eva. 2008. Faith in Politics: New Trends in the Study of Religion and Politics. World Politics 60 (2):315–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Belloc, Marianna, Drago, Francesco, and Galbiati, Roberto. 2016. Earthquakes, Religion, and Transition to Self-Government in Italian Cities. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 131 (4):1875–926.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berman, Harold J. 1983. Law and Revolution: The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Bisson, Thomas N. 2009. The Crisis of the Twelfth Century: Power, Lordship, and the Origins of European Government. Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boix, Carles. 2015. Political Order and Inequality: Their Foundations and Their Consequences for Human Welfare. Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bosker, Maarten, Buringh, Eltjo, and van Zanden, Jan Luiten. 2013. From Baghdad to London: Unravelling Urban Development in Europe and the Arab World 800–1800. Review of Economics and Statistics 95 (4):1418–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bouchard, Constance. 1987. Sword, Miter, and Cloister: Nobility and the Church in Burgundy, 990–1198. Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Bouchard, Constance. 1990. Merovingian, Carolingian and Cluniac Monasticism: Reform and Renewal in Burgundy. Journal of Ecclesiastical History 41 (3):365–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boucoyannis, Deborah A. 2015. No Taxation of Elites, No Representation: State Capacity and the Origins of Representation. Politics and Society 43 (3):303–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Conley, Timothy, Hansen, Christian, and Rossi, Peter. 2012. Plausibly Exogenous. Review of Economics and Statistics 94 (1):260–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Constable, Giles. 2010. The Abbey of Cluny: A Collecion of Essays to Mark the Eleven-Hundredth Anniversary of Its Foundation. Lit.Google Scholar
Cowdrey, Herbert Edward John. 1970. The Peace and the Truce of God in the Eleventh Century. Past and Present 46 (1):42–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cowdrey, Herbert Edward John. 2000. Popes and Church Reform in the Eleventh Century. Ashgate.Google Scholar
Dincecco, Mark, and Onorato, Massimiliano G.. 2018. From Warfare to Wealth: The Military Origins of Urban Prosperity in Europe. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dutaillis, Charles Petit. 1978. The French Commune in the Middle Ages. North-Holland.Google Scholar
Ertman, Thomas. 1997. Birth of the Leviathan: Building States and Regimes in Medieval and Early Modern Europe. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fried, Johannes. 2015. The Middle Ages. Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldewijk, Kees, Beusen, Arthur, and Janssen, Peter. 2010. Long-Term Dynamic Modeling of Global Population and Built-Up Area in a Spatially Explicit Way: HYDE 3.1. The Holocene 20 (4):565–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grzymala-Busse, Anna. 2012. Why Comparative Politics Should Take Religion (More) Seriously. Annual Review of Political Science 15:421–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grzymala-Busse, Anna. 2020. Beyond War and Contracts: The Medieval and Religious Roots of the European State. Annual Review of Political Science 23:19–36. <https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-050718-032628>.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, John A. 1985. Powers and Liberties: The Causes and Consequences of the Rise of the West. Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Holland, Tom. 2019. Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind. Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Howe, John. 2016. Before the Gregorian Reform: The Latin Church at the Turn of the First Millennium. Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Jasper, L. Kathryn. 2012. The Economics of Reform in the Middle Ages. History Compass 10 (6):440–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jordan, William Chester. 2001. Europe in the High Middle Ages. Penguin.Google Scholar
Levi, Margaret. 1988. Of Rule and Revenue. University of California Press.Google Scholar
Lienhard, Thomas. 2018. Frankish Kingdoms in 843. Retrieved 4 April 2019 from <http://www.menestrel.fr/?Territories&lang=en>..>Google Scholar
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. 2009. A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years. Allen Lane.Google Scholar
Maddicott, John R. 2010. The Origins of the English Parliament, 924–1327. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mann, Michael. 1986. The Sources of Social Power: A History of Power from the Beginning to AD 1760. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCormick, Michael, Georganteli, Eurydice, and Moore, Alexander, eds. 2018. DARM. The Digital Atlas of Roman and Medieval Civilization. Retrieved 2 April 2019 from <https://darmc.harvard.edu/maps>..>Google Scholar
Melville, Gert. 2016. The World of Medieval Monasticism: Its History and Forms of Life. Cistercian Publications.Google Scholar
Møller, Jørgen. 2018. The Ecclesiastical Roots of Representation and Consent. Perspectives on Politics 16 (4):1075–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moore, R.I. 2000. The First European Revolution, c. 970–1215. Blackwell.Google Scholar
Morris, Colin. 1989. The Papal Monarchy: The Western Church from 1050 to 1250. Clarendon.Google Scholar
Nüssli, Christos, and Nüssli, Marc-Antoine. 2008. Georeferenced Historical Vector Data 1000. Euratlas. Available at <euratlas.net/shop/maps_gis/gis_1000>..>Google Scholar
Oakley, Francis. 2010. Empty Bottles of Gentilism: Kingship and the Divine in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (to 1050). Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Oster, Emily. 2019. Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics 37 (2):187–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Philpott, Daniel. 2009. Has the Study of Global Politics Found Religion? Annual Review of Political Science 12 (1):183–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Poggi, Gianfranco. 1978. The Development of the Modern State: A Sociological Introduction. Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Reynolds, Susan. 1994. Fiefs and Vassals. Clarendon.Google Scholar
Reynolds, Susan. 1997 [1984]. Kingdoms and Communities in Western Europe, 900–1300. Clarendon.Google Scholar
Reynolds, Susan. 2012. The Middle Ages without Feudalism: Essays in Criticism and Comparison on the Medieval West. Ashgate.Google Scholar
Rokkan, Stein. 1975. Dimensions of State Formation and Nation-Building: A Possible Paradigm for Research on Variations within Europe. In The Formation of National States in Europe, edited by Tilly, Charles, 562–600. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Spruyt, Hendrik. 1994. The Sovereign State and Its Competitors. Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2010. When Distance Mattered: Geographic Scale and the Development of European Representative Assemblies. American Political Science Review 104 (4):625–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2011. States of Credit. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2014. Was Weber Right? The Role of Urban Autonomy in Europe's Rise. American Political Science Review 108 (2):337–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2016. Representation and Consent: Why They Arose in Europe and Not Elsewhere. Annual Review of Political Science 19:145–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2017. When Inclusive Institutions Failed: Lessons from the Democratic Revolutions of the Middle Ages. Working Paper. Available at <stasavage.com/research>..>Google Scholar
Stasavage, David. 2020. The Decline and Rise of Democracy: A Global History from Antiquity to Today. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Tilly, Charles. 1990. Coercion, Capital, and European States, AD 990–1990. Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Wahl, Fabian. 2015. Origins of Political Change. Structural Versus Exogenous Factors as Cause of the Late Medieval Guild Revolts. Available at <https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2633496>.CrossRef.>Google Scholar
Wahl, Fabian. 2018. Political Participation and Economic Development: Evidence from the Rise of Participative Institutions in the Late Medieval German Lands. European Review of Economic History 23 (2):193–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wejnert, Barbara. 2005. Diffusion, Development, and Democracy, 1800–1999. American Sociological Review 70 (1):53–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wickham, Chris. 2009. The Inheritance of Rome: A History of Europe from 400 to 1000. Penguin.Google Scholar
Wickham, Chris. 2016. Medieval Europe: From the Breakup of the Western Roman Empire to the Reformation. Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Wilson, Peter. 2016. Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire. Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Woodberry, Robert. 2012. The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy. American Political Science Review 106 (2):244–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Doucette and Møller supplementary material

Online Appendix

Download Doucette and Møller supplementary material(File)
File 623.6 KB
Supplementary material: Link

Doucette and Møller Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/SRXJLN
Link