Mats Morell och Martin Söderhäll awarded Heckscher Prize 2019

Smallholders’ and large estates’ reaction to changed market conditions 1860-1910

The prize was handed out at the 14th 14th Swedish Economic History meeting and 2nd Annual Conference of the Scandinavian Society and Social History 2021.

Explanation:
The article investigates how reduced transport costs and income growth in industrialising European countries during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century affected Swedish farmers, particularly focusing on the different reactions from smallholders on the one hand and larger estates on the other. The awarded article constitutes an outstanding combination of history, economic theory and empirical methods. It not only originally exploits a large data set at the farm-level, but it also frames its conclusions within current international debates and definitely expands our knowledge on this particular topic. The editorial team would nonetheless like to stress the quality of the other candidates, thus making awarding the 2019 Heckscher Prize an extremely difficult task.