MacMillan-CSAP Workshop on Quantitative Research Methods: Emily Erikson, “Social Networks and Port Traffic in Early-Modern Overseas Trade”

“Social Networks and Port Traffic in Early-Modern Overseas Trade”

Speaker: Emily Erikson, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Yale University

Abstract: This paper uses data from the logs of the English East India Company overseas voyages to consider the relationship between social network use and patterns of port traffic. Networks are known to both distribute new information and provide redundant information; they may both lead actors to explore new opportunities and at other times lead actors into redundant, herd-like behavior. Thus the use of networks could impact the distribution of traffic across ports in a trade network, leading to either greater or lesser concentrations of traffic. We explore this possibility across a number of different conditions. The results are intended to contribute to research on the causes driving differences in development trajectories. (LINK TO ADVANCE PAPER)

Emily Erikson is Assistant Professor of Sociology and the School of Management (by courtesy) of Yale University. Her research focuses on the development of the institutions of capitalism. She is the recent author of Between Monopoly and Free Trade: The English East India Company, 1600-1757 (Princeton University Press, May 2014) .