Political cleavages in Argentina, Australia, and Canada between 1860 and 1914: A test of Rogowski's 'Commerce and Coalitions'

Rogowski (1989) argues that the fundamental political divisions in society are conditioned by international trade. Changes in the direction of international trade alter the relative importance of domestic factor endowments. Factor endowments are the distribution across societies of the three classic factors of production: land, labor, and capital. He predicts that owners of abundant factors will coalesce and support free trade during expansions. Owners of scarce factors will react defensively. When international trade declines, the opposite takes place.; Rogowski's model fares well against the broad sweep of events he brings together in his work. However, few tests have been attempted. This work examines the model in the cases of Argentina, Australia, and Canada between 1860 and 1914. These cases are grouped elsewhere in the literature as "lands of recent settlement," and this literature seeks to explain why different political and economic patterns emerged in countries with similar factor endowments; and how these different patterns impacted on the evolution of the countries. Can Rogowski shed new light on these important questions?; We begin by reviewing the theoretical foundations of Rogowski's model and presenting the different criticisms. For each of the cases, we review data relative to Rogowski's characterization of factor endowments to establish if his assessment was correct. We identify and discuss the main political parties and interest groups searching for party cleavages that reflect the divisions over trade. We identify the political cleavages and review them against the patterns predicted by Rogowski.; Rogowski's assessment of the factor endowments of the cases is generally correct. However, he misrepresents Canada after the 1890s. The model accurately predicts the emergence of urban-rural cleavages in all three cases, but it is unable to account for the existence of particular cleavages (especially regionalism in all three cases and the emergence of class conflict in Argentina and Australia). Not all the actors aligned according to expectations. Certain groups supported trade policy choices contrary to the model's predictions. A sectoral model based on an export-oriented sector and an import-competing sector, which Rogowski criticizes and rejects, proves more helpful in explaining how the actors aligned.