ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book. The book examines the implicit rationality, if such a rationality actually exists, within seigniorial aristocracies and colonial elites, patrimonial management structures and its effects on the economic development of distinct times and societies. It addresses the subject from a comparative and innovative viewpoint is one of the main challenges for the future, papers on different regions and epochs were sought. The book provides historians with more up-to-date and rigorous grounds for discussion and comparative approaches on a subject that, implicitly or explicitly, has been very much present in understanding of ancien regime societies and economic development. For many years certain assumptions have governed the study of the aristocracy and its role in economic development. It has often been considered as a parasitic class, lacking both interest and rationality in managing its estates and, on the whole, it has been viewed as an obstacle to economic development.
