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Risky Business: pricing, governance, and integration in European insurance markets, c. 1400- c. 1870 This project aims to advance through collaboration the historical study of marine insurance and its institutions of governance. It will unite leading academics studying the topic in the Netherlands (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam), Italy (Università degli studi di Parma), and the United Kingdom (University of Cambridge). The network will create and compile a multinational, public database of recorded marine insurance prices from the earliest records (c. 15th century) to c. 1870 by bringing together existing private databases (data already compiled which otherwise may be lost), and adding new data gathered from primary sources in various international archives. Funding: Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Duration: Dec 2018-Mar 2022 Average - Transaction Costs and Risk Management during the First Globalization (Sixteenth-Eighteenth Centuries) This project focuses on the historical analysis of institutions and their impact on economic development through the investigation of a legal instrument – general average (GA) – which underpins maritime trade by redistributing damages’ costs across all interested parties. This will be pursued through the comparative investigation of GA in those European countries where substantial data exists: Italy, Spain, England, France and the Low Countries (1500-1800). Average and insurance were both created in the Middle Ages to facilitate trade through the redistribution of risk. Insurance has been widely studied, average – the expenses which can befall ships and cargoes from the time of their loading aboard until their unloading (due to accidents, jettison, and unexpected costs) – has been neglected. GA still plays an essential role in the redistribution of transaction costs, and being a form of strictly mutual self-protection, never evolved into a speculative financial instrument as insurance did; it therefore represents an excellent case of long-term effectiveness of a non-market economic phenomenon. Although the principle behind GA was very similar across Europe, in practice there were substantial differences in declaring and adjudicating claims. GA reports provide unparalleled evidence on maritime trade which, analysed quantitatively and quantitatively through a novel interdisciplinary approach, will contribute to the reassessment of the role played by the maritime sector in fostering economic growth during the early modern first globalization, when GA was the object of fierce debates on state jurisdiction and standardization of practice. Today they are regulated by the York-Antwerp Rules (YAR), currently under revision. This timely conjuncture provides plenty of opportunities for active engagement with practitioners, thereby fostering a creative dialogue on GA historical study and its future development to better face the challenges of mature globalization. Funding: European Commission Duration: Jul 2017-Dec 2022