The Burden of Dependency

The question of whether and, if so, how the South is "different" continues to intrigue students of American history, literature, and culture. Now, in the Burden of Dependency, economist Joseph J. Persky relates this question to the history of southern economic thought from its beginnings in the seventeenth century through the mid-twentieth. Closely reading the works of Thomas Jefferson, George Fitzhugh, Henry Grady, the Nashville Agrarians and others, Persky traces the history of an idea that was to have far-reaching consequences - the southern sense of economic dependency. Since the days of the first settlers, he explains southerners have drawn on both mercantilist and liberal traditions to critique trade regulations, excessive commercial profits, and unequal exchange between industrial and agricultural sectors. Like Latin Americans today, southerners deeply resented what they perceived as economic exploitation - first by Great Britain and later by the more powerful North. This resentment may help explain not only southern restiveness throughout much of U.S. history but also the very nature of the South's sense of regional identity. A useful and provocative essay, The Burden of Dependency moves the discussion of southern economic thought well beyond such issues as cotton and slavery. Calling into question the current de-emphasis of geography in modern economics, Joseph Persky throws new light on the concepts and attitudes that helped shape the political economy of what is perhaps the nation's most distinctive region.