The Economics of House of the Dragon
What can a dragon-themed telenovela tell us about economic growth in the Middle Ages?
The idea that we control the dragons is an illusion. They're a power man should never have trifled with. One that brought Valyria its doom. If we don't mind our own histories, it will do the same to us.
Viserys I Targaryen on episode 1, season 1 of House of the Dragon
”House of the Dragon” is my favorite tv show from last year, and a prequel to Game of Thrones. The plot follows the Targaryens, a family of incestuous dragon owners who rule the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros (actually only six but whatever), and the first season focuses on the start of a civil war between two potential heirs to the throne: the princess Rhaenyra Targaryen (her side is called “the Blacks”) and her half-brother Aegon Targaryen (head of “the Greens”). The show is basically Bridgerton with dragons, or a telenovela with higher production values. So what’s the show have to say about the economics of the middle ages?
Keeping Up With The Targaryens
SPOILER WARNING: the plot of season 1 is discussed.
First, a little backstory. The Seven Kingdoms of Westeros were, well, seven separate kingdoms, until this guy called Aegon Targaryen (aka “The Conqueror”) and his two sisters/wives showed up with three dragons and a small army and, through intimidation and war, annexed six of the seven. Aegon was succeeded by his son Aenys, but Aenys’s son Aegon was usurped by his half-uncle Maegor, who was an asshole, and later Maegor was usurped by Aegon (the second one)’s brother Jahaerys.
Jahaerys Targaryen had been king for half a century when the show kicks off. He had 12 children with his sister/wife Alysanne, but only two that actually matter: Aemon, the firstborn, and Baelon, both of who died. Everyone in the realm wondered who was going to succeed the King: Aemon’s only daughter Rhaenys, or Baelon’s oldest son Viserys. Because the King wanted to prevent a civil war over his succession, he made all the lords in the realm vote on the matter, and they chose Viserys 20 to 1 because he has two different chromosomes (and also used to ride Aegon the Conqueror’s very famous dragon before it died, but that’s not the point).
A decade and change later, Viserys has had a not super eventful reign, and his wife Aemma is pregnant; they’ve only had a daughter, Rhaenyra. Aemma dies without producing a male heir, and the royal council agrees to make Rhaenyra heir because, even though she’s a girl and therefore has cooties, Viserys’s brother Daemon is a crazy asshole (nevermind everyone literally just voted that brothers > daughters). Corlys Velaryon, Rhaenys’s very rich and powerful husband, gets upset about a bunch of things and has to be pacified by marrying off his (gay) son to Rhaenyra. Speaking of marriage, the grand vizier (“Hand of the King”) Otto Hightower has his 15 year old daughter Alicent, who is also the princess’s bestie1, trick the king into marrying her - and it works, so King Viserys is officially one of those creepy dads who follows his daughter’s friends on Instagram and likes all of their bikini pictures.
The King and Alicent have three sons (Aegon, the oldest; one with an eyepatch; and Ser Not Appearing In This Movie) and a daughter. Rhaenyra develops a crush on her uncle but instead is married off to the gay guy, and has three kids that are supposedly his but actually some other guy’s. There’s some pirate adventures nobody cares about, and the King becomes increasingly sick from super leprosy, so the Hightowers (who have become religious fanatics because of some family drama) run the show in the capital. Relations between the two halves of the family deteriorate increasingly due to the bastard allegations (despite both of the parents being blonde, and the gay guy being black, and all four of the grandparents having light hair too, their kids are all brunettes), and also some dragon ownership drama. At some point Rhaenyra’s gay husband fakes her death so she can marry her childhood crush, aka her uncle Daemon.
Viserys dies after the Velaryons manage to be in the spotlight for the millionth time (like bitches be for real basically all the drama in the show is their fault), and Otto and Alicent stage a coup to usurp the throne immediately afterwards because Rhaenyra was out of town. The royal council, who are all Hightower cronies, agrees to it, and they crown Aegon in front of the people. The Blacks start assembling their allies (four out of six kingdoms, by my count) to try and prevent a war, but the prince with the eyepatch accidentally kills his nephew, so peace is not an option anymore.
I kinda have to spoil the show to go on, but the book it draws from, Fire and Blood, points to the ensuing civil war (called the Dance of Dragons) being the beginning of the Targaryen dynasty’s multi-century decline, since basically all non-infant Targaryens and all their dragons died during the war.
Are dragons a drag on growth
From the earliest times of which we have record—back, say, to two thousand years before Christ—down to the beginning of the eighteenth century, there was no very great change in the standard of life of the average man living in the civilised centres of the earth. Ups and downs certainly. Visitations of plague, famine, and war. Golden intervals. But no progressive, violent change. Some periods perhaps 50 per cent better than others—at the utmost 100 per cent better—in the four thousand years which ended (say) in A.D. 1700
J. M. Keynes, “ “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren” (1931)"
But onto economics. What is the economy of the Seven Kingdoms like? Well, save for a few urban centers (King’s Landing, Oldtown, Lannisport, Gulltown, and White Harbor) most of the economy is rural, feudal, and agrarian. The real question is “why hasn’t Westeros had an Industrial Revolution”, especially by Game of Thrones, which is almost 300 years after the Dance of Dragons - and Westerosi life had barely improved since Bran the Builder erected the Wall some milennia prior.
In a very old Substack post you should take with a grain of salt, I described the sort of economy Westeros has: Malthusian. The Malthusian economy is one where living standards and the absolute size of the population are at odds: higher incomes can only be sustained in times of demographic collapse, and productivity growth is transformed directly into more people, rather than more output per person, leaving standards of living completely unchanged. It is possible for growth to occur, thanks to large drops in the popultion, expansions of trade, or certain technical improvements, but overall living standards barely rise. I’d also add that Westeros has extremely erratic weather2, with long and virulent winters followed by equally long and lush summers, meaning that land productivity is also erratic.
This type of economy, named after Thomas Malthus, is generally understood to have ended in the West after the Industrial Revolution and changes in land ownership, and the generally agreed upon reason is technological progress. The issue is why it was possible for the Industrial Revolution to happen at all, and why.3
A first reason is war; the realm has been, since the time of Aegon, embroiled in various uprisings and conflicts (Maegor’s whole deal; the Dance of Dragons; the Blackfyre Rebellions; Robert’s Rebellion, and the War of Five Kings), all of which sapped the realm of resources, manpower, and time that could have been used to develop and prosper, as well as imperil investments and thus discourage them. Of course, if weapons developments might have been encouraged, the existence of dragons (which are like nuclear weapons, to a degree, per GRRM) prevents that too.
A first group of reasons (shout out to Adam Ozimek) for why there is no prosperity in Westeros is simply that there are no stated mineral resources like coal, which would put a hamper on industrial progress. Labor does not appear to be scarce, and skilled laborers are very scarce, meaning that there are neither incentives nor avenues for technical progress. There is also the fact that magic and dragons reign supreme in Westeros, providing few incentives for scientific inquiry versus inquiry into the ways of R’hllor or the Drowned God.
Speaking of science, scientific inquiry is dominated by a sect called the maesters, who are the only specialists in Westeros - and they fiercely guard and gatekeep their secrets and knowledge, precisely the opposite of what was needed in real life. Openness, exploitability, and competition seemed to be key - versus the walled off byzentine debates of the maesters, who deny magic is real.4
These are the proximate causes, but what about the deep causes? Because for technology and science to make sense, first you need certain things. Some economists emphasize institutions and government, and this is the more traditional view - private property rights and freedom of contract, plus a reliable government, ensured market freedoms and the ensuing prosperity (read more about it here) - which is not uncontroversial, of course. But for instance, feudal property holdings were found to have been a detriment to the Industrial Revolution. Another set of economists, principally Deirdre McCloskey, put a focus on culture and beliefs - in a quasi Weberian way, changes in beliefs and attitudes permitted changes in government and the economy that resulted in a richer society - which is a hard to verify hypothesis, naturally.
But my take is that in the case of Westeros it’s both, and it comes down to a single thing: the Targaryens had dragons.
Rhaenyra’s tax policy
Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it’s not that simple. Tolkien can say that Aragorn became king and reigned for a hundred years, and he was wise and good. But Tolkien doesn’t ask the question: What was Aragorn’s tax policy? Did he maintain a standing army? What did he do in times of flood and famine?
Matt Yglesias has given the show crap for not having much in the way of politics - compared to Game of Thrones. For instance, the factions siding with each of the Five Kings during the GoT series, or with Robert versus King Aerys the Mad during the backstory, depend on a variety of both personal and political factors, and everyone is ultimately acting for their own self interest - Tywin Lannister has an innocent highborn woman and her two infant children brutally killed to stabilize the realm and prove his allegiance to the new king, for example. Meanwhile, who sides with the Blacks and who with the Greens has nothing to do with power and everything to do with values, beliefs, and family - only Jason Lannister has anything to gain from picking Alicent and Otto over Rhaenyra and Daemon, for instance.
But the way King Robert and his court have to play politics, while King Viserys and his don’t have to, have everything to do with how each got onto the Iron Throne - Robert had to schmooze and work four of the Seven Kingdoms into a rebellion, while Viserys and his ancestors just needed to show up with a walking Fat Man to whoever was giving them trouble. The reason why dragonbearing Targaryens don’t play politics is because they don’t need to - they have nukes at their disposal. Of course, it is possible to kill a dragon without one (the OG Targaryen sister-queen, Rhaenys, and her dragon Meraxes died conquering Dorne; Balerion the Black Dread, the largest dragon ever, was attacked by something above Old Valyria and died years later as a result), but it’s extremely difficult - not that season 8 of Thrones would make you believe that.
But the Targaryens also have the culture on their side; as Rhaenyra says in the first episode “people say we’re closer to gods than to men” purely because of their dragons, and the Faith of the Seven (the majority religion of the realm) adhered to the Doctrine of Exceptionalism as part of the rare complicated political compromise in dragon-having history - this doctrine allows for the Targaryens to violate religious law, especially against incest, due to their exceptional (dragon-related) status.
So, all in all, a combination of a history of absolute military superiority and a culture of religious awe gave the Targaryens enough power to at least remain on the throne undisturbed; nobody dared question the dragonlords because their superiority was a matter of religious doctrine, and the politics of Westeros were largely dormant simply because one does not negotiate with terrorists, or with gods.
Horkheimer and Hightower
Rhaenyra does not need a tax policy, or ideas about a standing army, or plans for infrastructure simply because nobody expects her to have any; the divine right of the Targaryens to rule is unquestioned by all. However, she does have one - in a Small Council scene later in the show, she’s shown as wanting an active crown that manages the nobles, versus Alicent’s laissez passer approach. But this is in spite of the crown being (or not) her birthright, not because of it. The Hightowers do have to plot to depose her, but it’s because they’re on the outside, and it’s all patrimonial and personal - they get Jason Lannister on their side because he dislikes Rhaenyra and likes power and glory, and powerful nobles are swayed because of personal loyalty (Cregan Stark), flattery (Grover Tully), family ties (Ormund Hightower, Otto’s nephew, and Jeyne Arryn, Rhaenyra’s cousin), and marriage alliances (Borros Baratheon wants a husband for his daughters).
The reason why all politics is personal probably has to do with the lack of a market, government, or anything forcing “universal reason” on the realm. To quote Max Weber (per John Ganz):
… patrimonialism can resort to monopolistic want satisfaction, which in part may rely on profit-making enterprises, fee-taking or taxation. In this case, the development of markets is, according to the type of monopolies involved, more or less seriously limited by irrational factors, l.e. important openings for profit are in the hands of the ruler and of his administrative staff. Capitalism is thereby either directly obstructed, if the ruler maintains his own administration, or is diverted into political capitalism, if there is tax farming, leasing or sale of offices, and capitalist provision for armies and administration.
Marx had quasi-similar ideas; to him, capitalism simply rationalized the feudal system into something resembling a factory, and party politics could sometimes degenerate into dividing the spoils to whoever controlled power. To both, capitalism was rational and universal (which is good) because it replaced personal deals and smoke-filled rooms with scientific production and competition (tell that to the nepo babies). Birth, privilege, violence, and cronyism determine success, not effort and talent.
John Ganz has written about the term political capitalism before (it’s a mess), and I’d say that what the Targaryens created is apolitical feudalism: hegemony over the political system is, save for a handful of times, guaranteed, but growth is virtually impossible, so normal politics operates as self-dealing by the elites, and true Political Conflict™ emerges when either growth becomes possible, or when hegemony is up for grabs - someone like Tywin Lannister doesn’t need to make hard choices when the Iron Throne is solidly occupied, he just needs to divide the spoils to keep it that way. This reading is very Gramscian, since his reading of politics is pretty much that either there is hegemony by a class and its ideology, or corporatist struggles over the spoils during domination and/or tightly contested power. To quote Ganz:
… we lack both the dynamism of the market and (therefore?) the possibility of hegemonic politics (or is it the other way around?), the universal cannot emerge, and so we are in a way “sinking into the abyss of a new dark age made more sinister and perhaps more prolonged by the lights of a perverted science,” to quote Winston Churchill.
So, a closely, bitterly divided society (like Westeros) is prone to self dealing over closely divided, but not contested, power - pure, raw domination just running out and about, in the form of explicit rackets by the politically connected. Horkheimer writes that this is opposite sovereignty, solidarity, and the rule of law itself - “each racket conspires against the spirit and all are for themselves. The reconciliation of the general and the special is immanent in the spirit; the racket is its irreconcilable contrast and its obfuscation in the ideas of unity and community”. Of course, this refers to a capitalist society, and the Westerosi issue is that there is no capitalism, so some room has to be given to the jazz haters of the world.
Conclusion
My take here is that the fact that the Targaryens can achieve absolute domination over Westerosi politics due to having an exalted place in the national culture, as well as legitimacy and (at least up to the Dance) literal weapons of mass destructions prevented the creation of any institutions of governance - Westeros simply does not have politics, only corporate grift. The occasional good (Jahaerys, Aegon V) or competent (Viserys II and Daeron II) king was almost entirely due to luck and good disposition, and not really to any rules that bound them.
Also everyone who is involved with the show at that level has said Alicent is gay and in love with Rhaenyra but that’s super besides the point (and Emily Carey, aka Young Alicent, got cancelled by Twitter for this because she’s some form of gay herself. SAD!).
My most crackpot ASOIAF opinion is that the Valyrian Freehold was built on top of an active supervolcano and that the Doom was a minor (but still severe) eruption.
I’ll leave the “define the Industrial Revolution” and related semantics discussions part to Davis Kedrosky and the economic history gang.
For what it’s worth some fans speculate that the maesters purposefully suppress all knowledge of and about magic, killed the last Targaryen dragons, and have steered Westerosi politics in their own favor for generations. Some of it is plausible IG.
Not sure if you know this, but the canon is that Valyria was built on top of 14 volcanoes which exploded simultaneously to cause the Doom.