Public Debt for Development? The Civil War Debt and the Shaping of the U.S. Developmental State

Nicolas Barreyre, Ehess

The historiography on the state generally approaches its object through notions of power and/or bureaucracy. This paper will argue that it can be very fruitful to focus on the actual use of state instruments to understand the development and transformation of the state and its action. Here, a focus on public debt after the Civil War will aim to show the shift from the antebellum use of State debt to promote railroads towards a dual use of Federal debt, on the one hand, to build an international financial infrastructure to channel investments in the US economy and, on the other hand, of multiplying municipal debts to create the urban infrastructure of the new stage of industrialization. This paper will thus argue that the U.S. state needs to be understood as a developmental state not through new forms of bureaucracy but through the creative use of the old instrument of public debt to shape the infrastructure necessary for bringing about a new industrial economy.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 197. Rethinking the Developmental State 4: North America