Joel Mokyr: belief

Transcript context

…I think there is a major revolution in Germany during and after Napoleon. You get a whole bunch of reforms. Most famous are reforms, of course, in Prussia, which is the main country in the northern part of Germany, in which they completely rejiggered their administration. The Stein-Hardenberg reforms basically create the world’s first really effective civil service. At the same time, what the Germans do, they invest very heavily in human capital. The evidence suggests that German universities and German schools were much more geared toward giving people a background in the kind of knowledge that helps creating the basis for a sort of second-generation manufacturing technology. Lots of this is associated, of course, with the reform of the German university system, associated with Wilhelm von Humboldt, who essentially created what one might call the idea of the modern research university. There’s also these technical universities, the Technische Hochschule, which the Germans founded. There’s a recent paper by a former graduate student of mine, Ralf Meisenzahl, at Chicago Fed, who shows that the closer you were to a university in the middle of the 19th century, the more likely you were to be in advanced manufacturing. I think, here it really is, to some extent, the improvement in human capital, but also the fact that the state in Prussia and in other places as well, this little state that basically convinced themselves that this was the way of the future. If Germany was going to be playing with the big boys and not being wiped out by Napoleon as they were in 1806, they should build an economy based on science. The odd thing is that, Britain, even so, it was the leader, really was actually late in catching that answer. British universities, really, by the middle of the 19th century, people start worrying about this, “Look, the Germans and the French have these more advanced institutes of higher education, and our universities are still way behind.” In the second half of the 19th century, there’s this sort of supposed decline of Britain because they’re still based on skills, whereas the Germans, more and more get committed to the application of scientific research to their economy. That takes a long time, and it’s not an easy thing. The two Germans invent things like organic chemistry: Justus von Liebig and Friedrich Wöhler. They make major contributions to electricity, to internal combustion engine, to a whole range of industries. A lot of that is based on science, and it’s striking, not just that German universities produce these scientists, but that businesses, particularly manufacturing, hire these people as consultants and put them on their board of governors and their board of trustees. That’s, I think, a striking thing. The Germans really, more than the British, realized the potential of science. Certainly by 1900, they’re leading the world, certainly in chemical, in electricity, in food processing industries. thing. The Germans really, more than the British, realized the potential of science. Certainly by 1900, they’re leading the world, certainly in chemical, in electricity, in food processing industries. It is, I think, above all, human capital, but also the policies that were there to support it. How much of a burden on your life has your new Nobel Prize been or is it just fun?…

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