The Origins of the Athenian Economic ARCHE
Abstract Histories of the Athenian Empire (478–404 BC) have traditionally been offered as political and military narratives. They explain the origins of a naval alliance created in 478/7 BC, the so-called Delian League under Athenian leadership and its development into an ‘empire’ (arche) sometime in mid-century. Moreover, most treat the phenomenon as comprehensible as a self-contained period of enquiry. This article takes issue with both approaches. Through close examination of a wide variety of evidence connected with Athenian activity during the formative years of the ‘Delian League’ (478 to ca. 465), it argues that the Athenians made immediate use of the League navy and funds to appropriate resources, profits and territory for themselves, especially in Thrace, beginning with the capture of Eion on the Strymon, but also that these interests explain other early activities. Finally, it argues that the Athenians' economic behaviour should be understood in the context of Athenian aims and activities in the Archaic period.
PUBLIC FINANCE AND WAR IN ANCIENT GREECE*
Before the Persian Wars the Greeks did not rely on public finance to fight each other. Their hoplites armed and fed themselves. But in the confrontation with Persia this private funding of war proved to be inadequate. The liberation of the Greek states beyond the Balkans required the destruction of Persia's sea power. In 478 bc Athens agreed to lead an alliance to do just this. It already had Greece's largest fleet. But each campaign of this ongoing war would need tens of thousands of sailors and would go on for months. No single Greek city-state could pay for such campaigns. The alliance thus agreed to adopt the Persian method for funding war: its members would pay a fixed amount of tribute annually. This enabled Athens to force Persia out of the Dardanelles and Ionia. But the Athenians also realized that their military power depended on tribute, and so they tightened their control of its payers. In so doing they turned the alliance into an empire.
Working Knowledge: Employee Innovation and the Rise of Corporate Intellectual Property, 1800-1930
This book presents the legal and business history of corporate ownership of employee knowledge. Skilled workers of the early nineteenth century enjoyed a degree of professional independence because workplace knowledge and technical skill were their 'property,' or at least their attribute. In most sectors of today's economy, however, it is a foundational and widely accepted truth that businesses retain legal ownership of employee-generated intellectual property. In "Working Knowledge", Catherine Fisk chronicles the legal and social transformations that led to the transfer of ownership of employee innovation from labor to management. This deeply contested development was won at the expense of workers' entrepreneurial independence and ultimately, Fisk argues, economic democracy. By reviewing judicial decisions and legal scholarship on all aspects of employee-generated intellectual property and combing the archives of major nineteenth-century intellectual property - producing companies - including DuPont, Rand McNally, and the American Tobacco Company - Fisk makes a highly technical area of law accessible to general readers while also addressing scholarly deficiencies in the histories of labor, intellectual property, and the business of technology.