Innovation in property rights and economic development in lombardy, eighteenth- twentieth centuries

Introduction This chapter deals with the contribution of state led institutional reforms in property rights since the second half of the eighteenth century to changing Lombard agriculture and to accelerating economic development, which made this one of the most dynamic and productive regions in contemporary Europe. More speci¿cally, our focus will be on a succession of reforms which began in eighteenth-century western Lombardy, as a province in the Austrian empire, and which were then pursued under Napoleonic rule in the early nineteenth century and later, again under Austrian rule, generalized to the other areas of Lombardy.