73415 - Financial History

Learning outcomes

This course is designed to provide students with an understanding of the evolution of both financial techniques and financial systems in a broad historical perspective. Topics will include institutional innovations, formation of financial markets, interplay of financial development and economic growth. Special consideration will be devoted to the complex relationship of public and private finance in shaping modern financial system.

At the end of the course students will be able to:

-         place in historical perspective the main themes in financial theory;

-        understand the working of State finance;

-         identify key links connecting finance and economic development;

-         understand the origin of modern financial system.

Course contents

Part I - Private finance from pre-industrial Europe to the modern world (Prof. Massimo Fornasari)

1. Europe, Commercial Revolution and Finance (XIII-XV centuries)

2. Finance and territorial states (XVI-XVIII centuries)

3. Financing British Industrial Revolution

4. The Second Industrial Revolution and the role of modern financial systems: from the mid-nineteenth century to the crisis of 1929

5. Regulation and Deregulation from the Thirties to the Present Day

Part 2 - Public finance from city-states to the Welfare State (prof. Mauro Carboni)

1. At the origins of modern public finance

2. From the "minimum" State to the Welfare State

Readings/Bibliography

M. Fornasari, La banca, la borsa, lo Stato. Una storia della finanza (secoli XIII-XXI), Torino, Giappichelli 2017.

M. Carboni, Stato e finanza pubblica in Europa dal medioevo a oggi, Torino, Giappichelli 2008

Teaching methods

Lectures and special topic seminars

Assessment methods

Written exam

Office hours

See the website of Massimo Fornasari

See the website of Mauro Carboni