Flora, Cosmos, Salvatio: Pre-modern Academic Institutions and the Spread of Ideas

While good ideas can emerge anywhere, it takes a community to develop and disseminate them. In this Quantitative History webinar, David de la Croix of UCLouvain will reconstruct how interpersonal connections formed through institutional affiliations across premodern Europe (1084–1793), where roughly 200 universities and 150 academies of sciences housed thousands of scholars and produced an extensive network of intellectual exchange. By modelling the spread of ideas on this academic landscape, David and his co-authors find exposure patterns that align with observed urban developments—such as botanic gardens, astronomical observatories, and Protestantism. Scholars’ mobility and multiple affiliations sustained diffusion, and counterfactual simulations highlight the bridging role of scientific academies. He will also show that the spread of ideas through the affiliation network was locally fragile but globally robust, underscoring academia as a key ingredient of early European development.

David de la Croix’s co-authors: Rossana Scebba (UCLouvain and KU Leuven), Chiara Zanardello (Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse)

Discussant: Ying Bai, Professor, Department of Economics, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Ying is also our Fellow)