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Great Divergence

Broadberry et al. (2015) — British Economic Growth 1270–1870

Citation. Broadberry, Stephen, Bruce M. S. Campbell, Alexander Klein, Mark Overton, and Bas van Leeuwen. British Economic Growth, 1270–1870. Cambridge University Press, 2015.

Summary

Section titled “Summary”

The canonical long-run reconstruction of British (formerly English) real GDP and per-capita income from the medieval period through industrial maturity, produced by the Broadberry-led team at Warwick and Oxford. Extends earlier reconstructions (Deane-Cole, Crafts-Harley, Feinstein) backward by 500 years and forward by careful sectoral integration. Presents a continuous, rigorously constructed per-capita income series alongside detailed sectoral output series for agriculture, industry, and services.

The book has reshaped both the Industrial Revolution debate and the Great Divergence debate by making British growth visible over five centuries rather than five decades. Combined with Broadberry’s subsequent comparable reconstructions for China (Broadberry, Guan, Li 2018), India (Broadberry, Custodis, Gupta 2015), and other major economies, it provides the quantitative baseline against which most modern Great-Divergence claims are now tested.

Key claims

Section titled “Key claims”
  • British real GDP per capita can be reconstructed continuously from 1270, with moderate confidence intervals, using sectoral output methods combined with population reconstructions.
  • British per-capita income grew substantially between 1270 and 1700, not just after 1760 — the IR is part of a much longer growth trajectory than the “take-off” framing allowed.
  • The revised series places British pre-industrial growth higher than the earlier Deane-Cole estimates but lower than naive interpretations of commodity-trade volumes might suggest.
  • Compared to parallel reconstructions for China, India, and the Ottoman Empire, the data show Britain pulling ahead substantially before the classical Industrial Revolution period — consistent with a longer, earlier Great Divergence than the California School allowed.
  • The Industrial Revolution is the terminal acceleration of a longer growth trend, not its origin.