The comparative development of financial and business systems: the historical development of stock exchanges, capital markets and different typologies of financial intermediaries; the measurement of different dimensions of financial development, including the access to and the use of financial services by households and small-and-medium enterprises; the interlocks between the financial sector, the corporate economy and the political system; the regulation of business systems and the design and implementation of industrial policies; corporate governance, ownership structures and the market for corporate control; the evolution of commercial legislation and the protection and implementation of shareholders and debtor property rights; the relationship between the financial sector, monetary management, government finance and tax systems; the accumulation and distribution of financial wealth and more generally the historical dynamics of inequality