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Razorbacks, Ticky Cows, and the Closing of the Georgia Open Range: The Dynamics of Institutional Change Uncovered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Shawn Everett Kantor
Shawn Everett Kantor
Affiliation:
Assistant Proffesor of Economics, Univeresity of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721.
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Extract

This article attempts to explain why the adoption of potentially productive institutions is delayed and why inefficient ones persist by exploring the dynamics of institutional change in a particular historical case—the closing of the Georgia open range in the late nineteenth century. A closed range policy would have generated net benefits for specific regions of Georgia, but distributional conflicts, coupled with high transaction costs, made a voluntary agreement to do that unattainable. The article describes the Georgia legislature's important role in facilitating the adoption of a policy that led to more rapid agricultural development in the postbellum period.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 51 , Issue 4 , December 1991 , pp. 861 - 886
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1991

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