Re: Reoply to AGF Asian melt-down and the long cycle dating game

Mon, 1 Dec 1997 12:42:59 +0100
Austrian Embassy (austria@it.com.pl)

Dear AGF, and all

it does not unsettle your theory; the only smaller point of contention
between your dating scheme (which you share with others) and my own (which
I share with Bornschier) is the period 1832-1848. For you, it is still a
down, while the Bornschier/Tausch upswing starts in the mid 1830s.

I mentioned the Kuznets only because they often are mixed up with the
Kondratieffs. If anything, we are going to have now a Kuznets down, but not
a Kondratieff down.

The data: these are the classic Joshua Goldstein two series about world
industrial production from 1740 onwards, contained in the Appendix to his
1988 book. Transformed into yearly growth rates. Updated after 1975 by IMF
and World Bank data about world GNP. Of course: these are just estimates,
but better than nothing.

About social movements: Volker Bornschiers marvellous recent Transaction
book gives very compelete answers, which will be quite in line with your
general argument. It is based on quite good research, amongst others on
strike etc. statistics from the 19th century onward.

Kind regards to you all

Arno Tausch

----------
> From: Gunder Frank <agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca>
> To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
> Subject: Re: Asian melt-down and the long cycle dating game
> Date: Montag, 01. Dezember 1997 02:58
>
> AGF responds to Arno Tausch only to say
> 1. I do not disoute what you say about Kuznetgs cycles, because I
> did/do not discuss them.
> 2. I do dispute what you say about Kondratieff cycles, though
> 3. I have some doubts myself and was just sdaying to my wife Nancy that
> maybe the K data are wrong and or wrongly interpreted, since some
> disconfirm my hypothesis and therefore unsettle my theory, which is not
> nice, eg:
>
> 4.My hypothesis was that up-phases in long cuycles of social movements
> ocurr in the down phases of the Kondratieffs. That turned out to be
> true for the 1816-48 K down, and the 1967- K down, but the otehr big SM
> up was in 1890-1913 which was supposedly a K up. so
>
> 5. Can YOU help me and CONFirm my SM up=econ down thesis, at least for
> the period before WWI?
>
> thanks
> gunder
> On Wed, 26 Nov 1997,
> Austrian Embassy wrote:
>
> > Date: Wed, 26 Nov 1997 11:44:22 +0100
> > From: Austrian Embassy <austria@it.com.pl>
> > To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
> > Subject: Asian melt-down and the long cycle dating game
> >
> > Dear Andre Gunder and folks,
> >
> > A.G., you are right (parts of Asia will strongly recover) but you are
wrong
> > on one major point - the Kondratieff cycle dating game. I have very
strong
> > empirical convictions about it, based on Joshua Goldstein's data series
> > (1988) about the growth of industrial production in the
(industrialised)
> > world. Submit these data to the calculation of incremental yearly
growth
> > rates, and apply the multivariate EXCEL polynomial analysis, you arrive
at
> > the startling result that there are indeed very strong Kuznets cycles
(6th
> > order polynomial expressions), to be dated (R^2 given in %)
> >
> > 1741-56 23.5%
> > 1756-74 36.1%
> > 1774-1793 34.8%
> > 1793-1812 39.7%
> > 1812-1832 16.4%
> > 1832-62 25.7%
> > 1862-85 36.3%
> > 1885-1908 56.2%
> > 1908-32 44.2%
> > 1932-58 19.1%
> > 1958-75 68.8%
> > 1975-97 66.0% (this is based on UN and IMF data, since Joshua's
series
> > ends in 1975)
> >
> > These are calculations, based on the original data without any moving
> > averages. So Chris Chase Dunn is right all along: there are very strong
> > Kuznets cycles.
> >
> > Secondly, you have to control for the very short term Kitchins, in
order to
> > measure your Kondratieffs. So I applied to the same data series 5-year
> > moving averages, and you get the
> > following Kondratieffs (6th order polynomial expressions, based on
EXCEL):
> >
> >
> > 1756-1832 R^2 30.8%
> > 1832-1885 9.2%
> > 1885-1932 50.5%
> > 1932-1982 40.3%
> >
> >
> > My dating scheme by and large corresponds to that of our friend Volker
> > Bornschier in Zurich, whose recent book on Western society
(Transaction,
> > the German original dates back 1988, but has been reworked and enlarged
for
> > the English edition) is a must for all of you who are interested in
that
> > kind of questions.
> >
> > The major error of some approaches is to mix up the Kuznets cycle low
of
> > around 1908 with a Kondratieff low. Mandel, Joshua Goldstein and many
> > others date their Kondratieff low at around 1890 or somewhere, so they
> > don't get the uopswing out of 1885 and the downswing in the 1930s
properly
> > into focus. Bornschier has convincingly shown I
> > think the technological and societal factors that distinguish the 1870s
and
> > early 1880s as well as the 1930s as a Kondratieff cycle low.
> >
> > What is the beef, then? Major disturbances but no Kondratieff crash in
> > Asia; perhaps also an Arrighi process where some swimmers (China) get
their
> > heads out of the flood by
> > dumping others (Malaysia etc., those with a secular negative current
> > account in the Amir sense) down, with the stability of world capitalism
as
> > a three-layer systems remaining intact (here I strictly follow our
friend
> > Giovanni).
> >
> > Kind regards around the world,
> >
> > Yours humbly Arno Tausch from Warsaw
> >
> > PS more of that in my graphs that you can find in my WSN Archive
network
> > article on Transnational Integration etc.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Andre Gunder Frank
> University of Toronto
> 96 Asquith Ave Tel. 1 416 972-0616
> Toronto, ON Fax. 1 416 972-0071
> CANADA M4W 1J8 Email
agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca
>
> Some Home/Web Pages:
>
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> http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystes/archive/bios/gunder/gunder97cd.html
> http://csf.colorado.edu/authors
> gopher://csf.colorado.edu/11/psn/authors/frank.gunder
> gopher://csf.colorado.edu/11/wsystems.pubs
>
>
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>