Printing and Protestants: Reforming the Economics of the Reformation

Abstract

The causes of the Protestant Reformation have long been debated. This paper attempts to revive and econometrically test the theory that the spread of the Reformation is linked to the spread of the printing press. The proposed causal pathway is that the printing press permitted the ideas of the Reformation to reach a broader audience. I test this hypothesis by analyzing data on the spread of the press and the Reformation at the city level. An econometric analysis which instruments for omitted variable bias suggests that within the Holy Roman Empire, cities within 10 miles of a printing press by 1500 were 57.4 percentage points more likely to be Protestant by 1600. These results are robust, though the effects are weaker, across Western Europe. The analysis also suggests that the early spread of press affected religious choice into the 19 th century.

Historical Development

“…Another example is the interdependence between the printing press and both the Protestant Reformation (Dittmar, 2011;Rubin, 2011) and the Atlantic trade (Dittmar, 2011). We have also seen that Catholic conflict with the Ottoman Empire helped enable the spread of the Protestant religion across Europe (Iyigun, 2008).…”

“…His teachings quickly spread, partly facilitated by the recent invention of the printing press (Rubin, 2011). He objected to corruption in the Catholic Church, and in particular, to the selling of indulgences.…”

“…For more on this, seeRubin (2011) andCantoni (2012). For more on this, seeRubin (2011) andCantoni (2012).…”

The political economy of mass printing: Legitimacy and technological change in the Ottoman Empire

“…While the ulema made up a good portion of the literate population and certainly could have employed the press for propaganda or communication, the potential downsides were devastating. As noted below, the leaders of the Protestant Reformation were able to use the press to undermine the Church despite low levels of literacy in Europe (Rubin, 2011b). The mechanisms they employed -pictures and public readings -could easily have undermined religious authority.…”

“…21 There were plenty of reasons why religious authorities wanted to control the spread of the press in Europe -most prominently, the success of the Reformation was dependent on the Reformers' ability to circulate vast amounts of pamphlets (Rubin, 2011b). Indeed, the Church attempted to control the spread of books that challenged its interests through the repression of books during the Spanish Inquisition of the 1490s, the promulgation of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum (''List of Prohibited Books'') in 1559, and executions of French publishers of Protestant literature (Febvre and Martin, 1958).…”