The proper concerns of economic history — ultimate and proximate growth causality?

Abstract

In an extended review of the arguments advanced by Mancur Olson concerning the economic rise and decline of nations Angus Maddison drew an interesting distinction between ultimate and proximate causality which implicitly invited consideration of both the nature of the discipline of economic history and the key causal factors influencing the rate of economic growth in both the short and long run.¹ To my knowledge nobody has taken the opportunity to build upon this distinction, although sustained analyses of deeper causality are less rare than when Maddison was writing.²