DP15434 From a common empire to colonial rule: commodity market disintegration in the Near East

Author(s):	Laura Panza
Publication Date:	November 2020
Date Revised:	February 2022
Keyword(s):	cointegration, Colonial linkages, Interwar era, market integration, Near East
JEL(s):	N75, N95
Programme Areas:	Economic History
Link to this Page:	cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=15434

This paper investigates the impact of the disruption of the Ottoman Empire on the integration of regional and colonial commodity markets in the Near East during 1923-1939. Exploiting a novel dataset on quarterly wholesale prices in interwar Syria, Egypt, Turkey, France and the UK, it studies two dimensions of integration: price convergence, to assess the extent of price dispersion, and market efficiency, to quantify the magnitude and speed of price convergence across markets. The results indicate that while regional markets disintegrated throughout the period, reflecting the anti-global environment of the interwar era, colonial market linkages strengthened from the 1930s.