Frontiers of Finance: The Political Economy of Public Debt in the Dutch Republic

This book analyses the political economy of provincial public debt within the federal Dutch Republic. Public debt management of provinces other than Holland forms an understudied research area. Frontiers of Finance: The Political Economy of Public Debt in the Dutch Republic shows that the domestic effect of Holland's financial revolution and Amsterdam's subsequent rise to an international financial centre was limited. Instead, the fiscal and legal fragmentation caused differences in risk, capital supply, transaction costs and, consequently, borrowing costs. The merits of Holland’s financial revolution were thus not transferable to another context. The results are relevant for wider debates about the role of institutions and the financial sector for economic growth.