| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 88.4

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 88.4 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Tales of Two Cities: Race and Economic Culture in Early Republican North and South America: Guayaquil, Ecuador, and Baltimore, Maryland. By Camilla Townsend. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000. xxiv, 320 pp. Cloth, $45.00, ISBN 0-292-78167-9. Paper, $19.95, ISBN 0-292-78169-5.)

Camilla Townsend's provocative book compares two early republican river ports whose good economic times were tied to exports. She profiles the societies between 1820 and 1835 to explain the roots of poverty and to answer the question of why one city developed an egalitarian and inclusive ethic while the other did not. Her answer is "economic culture," a vague phrase that is too narrow to answer her questions satisfactorily. 1

Hers, she says, is a study of culture, not of economics. Individual and collective portrayals maintain interest and flesh out generalizations. Data supplied on wages and living standards are anecdotal. This might be excused because her study is (after all) "cultural." But one must nevertheless question whether the numbers are representative, since series of wages and prices are lacking. . . .

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