Economic Backwardness in History: Deviation from a Eurocentric Theme

This paper aims to demonstrate that the economic behaviour of ordinary men and women in the pre-colonial Deccan was as much ‘capitalistic’ as that of similar agents in contemporary Europe. The difference in the economic trajectories of the two societies can be reduced to different sets of state building institutions. State building in the Deccan was a much more accommodative and open process than in many parts of Europe. Further, the ecology of the Deccan has its own peculiar characteristics. These basic differences structured incentives for economic agents in such a way that different sets of actions became economically rational in these two systems. Consequently, it would not be correct to view the pre-colonial political economy of the Deccan as being ‘non-capitalistic’ in some way. At most, one can argue that economic agents in 18th century Europe acted in a fashion different from those in the 18th century Deccan, because their incentives were structured differently, not because they responded to different sets of motives.