The project focuses on the comparison of three important dimensions of living standards: Numeracy as measured with the age heaping strategy (see below), in order to approximate one important dimension of human capital; Inequality of incomes within the European societies; Anthropometric indicators, in particular heights of both adults and children.

The LEG network (Long-term Energy- Growth), with a hub at Lund University, aims at establishing a consistent long-run dataset (1800-2000) for energy, including traditional energy sources, based on comparable standards across an increasing number of European countries. The long term objective is to create a data-base on energy that will be openly available for researchers, and to shed light on the crucial issue of how important energy is for economic growth.

The Historical National Accounts project aims to give a quantitative overview as to how the various parts of Europe have developed in the long run and to produce a Europe-wide database on economic growth and productivity, covering the highest possible number of European countries. Furthermore, the aim is to organise education and training activities around this research agenda and to stimulate comparative analyses on levels and growth rates of productivity and economic welfare. The final results of this project will be embedded in the data-hub on long-term economic growth and structural change of the Groningen Growth and Development Centre.

European economic history as it stands today is still little more than a collection of national economic histories. A truly European approach needs to overcome the artefact of aggregation along the lines of the 19th century nation states as set by national statistical offices. The Historical Economic Geography Project (HEGPro) aims to break down the economic development of nation-states into that of their regional units to produce a synthesis of Europe’s historical economic geography 1900-2000.

Among other things, GLOBALEURONET aims to promote research on European market integration, on macroeconomic and financial fluctuations, and on economic growth. This project intends to make contributions to all three areas, building on recent developments in statistical large-scale aggregation of information.

GlobalEuroNet organizes each year a Summer School, under the scientific endorsement of the European Historical Economics Society (EHES) and in cooperation with the Marie-Curie Research Training Network ‘Unifying the European Experience’.

Economic history has emerged in many European countries as a dynamic discipline based on rigorous analytical categories and empirical methods. The demand for education and training in theoretically-driven analysis of the past has been relentlessly growing since the 1980s, and new centers promoting excellence in teaching and research have been established. Economic historians provide now both undergraduate and post-graduate students in economics, business, social and political sciences all over Europe with a long-run perspective of the sources of economic growth, the expansion of international trade, the international movements of capital and labour, or the role of institutions in enhancing (or hindering) economic development. Read more