Website/e-book about sovereign default

January 26, 2015 12:28 PM

I'm looking for a book or website I read a few years ago about sovereign default and how it's actually a GOOD thing. The author pointed out several examples in history where countries had defaulted on their debt and emerged more-or-less okay (if I recall correctly there were examples dating back to antiquity). Does anyone have any idea what this was?
posted by miltthetank to Law & Government (4 answers total)

Krugman is a big fan of sovereign default and has written about it regularly on his blog.
posted by alms at 1:06 PM on January 26, 2015

Response by poster: I do like Krugman, but it wasn't him -- I'm pretty sure the site was an e-book (with a sidebar full of links to various chapters, and maybe even an index). It was also the sort of thing that wouldn't have been updated except sporadically.
posted by miltthetank at 1:15 PM on January 26, 2015

Possibly this?: Debt and Economic Renewal in the Ancient Near East, by Michael Hudson and Marc Van De Mieroop The book is about ancient banking, debt, finance, etc... and one chapter is dedicated to the tradition of debt forgiveness. I've seen the paper book but I don't think it's contents are online (although therer are plenty of citations.) You can use WorldCat to see if it is in a library near you.
posted by CincyBlues at 7:25 PM on January 26, 2015

Debt: The first 5000 years taught me what little I know about debt free jubilees in history.
posted by mearls at 6:21 PM on February 2, 2015