Old South, New South: Economic History of the Southern Economy

Vocabulary flashcards covering key concepts and terms from Gavin Wright’s Old South, New South (Economic History of the Southern Economy).

Old South, New South

A framing term for Gavin Wright’s view that the post–Civil War South shifted from a backward, plantation-dominated economy to a more diversified and prosperous economy through fundamental institutional and labor-market changes.

Southern labor market

A regional labor market in the South that operated largely independently from national and international labor markets, especially from 1870 to 1940, shaping wage levels and mobility.

regional labor market isolation

The condition in which the South’s unskilled labor market remained separate from other U.S. regions, limiting wage convergence with the North and influencing economic development.

factor-price equalization theorem

A theory that free movement of factors (like labor) should equalize factor prices (wages) across regions; Wright argues this did not apply to the pre‑World War I South because its cotton economy tied wages to world demand and kept regions economically distinct.

colonial economy

A characterized view of the South as a peripheral economy with external capital and limited indigenous technological development, providing raw materials and simple goods to the national/international system.

liberation of the Southern economy

The postbellum transition in which the South moved away from slave-based labor and a closed, low-wage regime toward wage labor and new landholding patterns, enabling integration with broader markets.

sharecropping

A postwar labor system in which tenants work land owned by others in return for a share of the crop, often coupled with debt and credit arrangements, decentralizing labor control from planters.

cropper

A laborer who works a plot of land for a share of the crop rather than a cash wage; legally distinguished as a form of wage labor rather than a tenancy.

tenant farmer (cash rent)

A farmer who rents land for cash, rather than sharing crops, representing a move up the agricultural ladder for some, and a path to accumulation via ownership for others.

crop lien

A legal claim on a crop as security for credit or rent, a foundational device that allowed freedmen and tenants to obtain supplies and continue farming despite cash shortages.

furnish

Credit extended by landowners or local merchants for food, supplies, and necessities, typically paid back from future crop proceeds, tying laborers to local credit networks.

squad system

An intermediate labor organization in the plantation era where two to eight workers (often kin-based) worked together under a foreman, signaling decentralization from larger gangs.

agricultural ladder

The progression path for Black and white farmers from sharecropping to tenants to eventual landownership, tied to credit access and asset accumulation.

plantation belt

A geographic area with large-scale, slave-era plantation farming, especially in the Mississippi–Louisiana–Arkansas corridor and adjacent regions, central to early Southern agriculture.

cotton belt

The broad cotton-growing region of the South, whose soils, climate, and capital were historically oriented toward cotton production and price cycles.

cotton demand elasticity

The near-unit elasticity of demand for U.S. cotton (elasticity ≈ 1.0) indicating that Southern incomes from cotton were driven by world demand more than by local productivity.

boll weevil

A cotton pest that began affecting Southern agriculture in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, leading to shifts in cultivation but not a wholesale collapse of cotton—prompting adaptation rather than diversification.

Southern Farmers’ Alliance

A coalition of farmers in the South (1880s–1890s) promoting cooperatives, discount credit, and cooperative marketing; a precursor to Populism and a key vehicle for agrarian protest.

subtreasury plan

A proposed national program to hold crops in warehouses and issue treasury notes for 80% of their value, enabling cheap credit and the ability to ‘hold the crop’ against price declines.

mules

A key farm asset whose rising prices from the late 19th to early 20th century increased the cost of farming and affected the economic ladder and credit dynamics in the South.

disfranchisement

Late 19th–early 20th century laws and practices that restricted Black voting rights in the South, reshaping politics, education funding, and regional economic priorities.

per pupil expenditures (race)

The stark racial disparity in school funding in the South (late 19th to early 20th century), with white schools receiving far more funding than Black schools, influencing long-run socioeconomic outcomes.

self-sufficiency vs. market orientation

The tension in Southern farming between maintaining local food production for safety and debt reasons (self-sufficiency) and shifting toward market-oriented cotton production for cash.

cotton belt geography

The spatial distribution of cotton cultivation across the South, including both plantation districts and smaller farming regions, shaped by history and land use.

Atlantic labor market

A broad labor market extending across the Atlantic and domestic frontiers, wherein immigration and international demand interacted with U.S. industry to shape wages and mobility.

foreign-born labor and migration cycles

The scale and sequencing of immigrant labor flows to U.S. industry around the turn of the 20th century, tightly linked to business cycles and demand, affecting regional wage dynamics.