| Titre | La faucille et la faux. [Un exemple de dépendance temporelle] | |
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| Auteur | George Grantham | |
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Revue | Etudes rurales |
| Numéro | no 151-152, 1999 Autres temps, autres lieux | |
| Page | 103-131 | |
| Résumé anglais |
The sickle and the scythe. An instance of path dependence -
The morphological characteristics of the domesticated cereals have been affected by the techniques of harvest at the time they were domesticated. Wheat was domesticated under the regime of the sickle; oats under the much later regime of the scythe. Because the sickle selected for a comparatively loose attachment of the seed to the stalk, while the scythe for a strong attachment, farmers could not profitably employ the more rapid technique of scything in harvesting the bread cereals without suffering unacceptable loss of seed from spillage. At the same time, there was no reason to employ the sickle to reap oats when they could be more efficiently mowed using the scythe. The simultaneous use of both techniques in harvesting the small grains is a case of path dependence, in which an initial condition - here the difference in the date at which the cereals were domesticated - had long-lasting consequences for the technology and economic organization of the grain harvest. Source : Éditeur (via Persée) |
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| Article en ligne | http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/rural_0014-2182_1999_num_151_1_4118 |
