Forging Links between Regions

Money Decentralization under Direct Democracy Procedures. The Case of Classical Athens

“…Modern evidence shows that the Ancient Greek economy and more specifically, that of Classical Athens, was much more sophisticated and complex than previously thought and had many modern characteristics. Such evidence is provided, among others, by Cohen (1992), Morris (2004), Amemiya (2007), Bitros and Karayannis (2008), Kyriazis (2009), Engen (2010), Halkos and Kyriazis (2010), Lyttkens (2013), Bergh and Lyttkens (2014), Bresson (2016aBresson ( , 2016b, Harris (2016), Woolmer (2016), Economou and Kyriazis (2017) and Bitros et al (2020) and the references they provide therein. Athenians formed the Athenian Alliance , also known as the Delian League, to continue the war against the Persians, which lasted till the so called "Peace of Kallias" (the Athenian negotiator) in 449 BCE.…”

“…Free movement of an extensive variety of goods and services, based on market economy principles and a property rights protection environment, was established between Athens and its allies (Woolmer 2016;Economou and Kyriazis 2017). Moreover, Piraeus became the international entrepôt of antiquity due primarily to the huge volume of commercial transactions that were taking place there (Cohen 1992, p. 141;Hansen 2006;Bresson 2016aBresson , 2016bWoolmer 2016). Thus, the Athenian Alliance was, in some of its aspects, the forerunner of later customs and monetary unions.…”

“…Such an issue deserves a detailed separate analysis, however, due to space limitations we won't expand more than the evidence we provide below. 11 Money creation by the private sector (silver bullion, bronze small value coins, money creation by banks, war booty) and the treasury-temples.12 Regarding monetary policy transmission with emphasis on the expectation channel seeWilliams (2011) andAbbassi and Linzert (2012).13 It is verified that during the Classical period Athens achieved economic growth(Morris 2004;Ober 2015;Bresson 2016a;Harris 2016;Woolmer 2016) although relatively slow by some modern standards.…”

Institutions, Trade, and Growth: The Ancient Greek Case of Proxenia

“…Mack (2022) notes how centrality in the proxeny network correlates with territory size, the latter being a proxy for economic resources. Woolmer (2015) discusses proxeny, together with asylia (see Table 1) and other privileges, as tools that poleis could use to attract merchants to their markets, a point shared by others (Walbank 1978;Burke 1992;Reger 2007). Terpstra (2019) argues that proxeny grants could have helped foreign traders operate in Greek markets.…”

“…Further, other legal features, like the right to reprisals, sulan, made the economic environment risky. The archaic principle was that if one had been harmed by citizens of another polis who could not be brought to justice (for instance, because they had left), then any citizen of the offenders' polis could be held accountable for the injury caused, with either their person or their assets (Woolmer 2015;Bresson 2016). While in later periods this right was not exercised by individuals directly, but had to be officially recognized by their city, it was still operational and a source of considerable risk.…”