Institutional change is shaped by historical conditions and initial choices.

Evidence

By path dependence we mean that the process of institutional change is shaped by historical conditions and initial institutional choices. Thus two societies that start with somewhat different institutions (potentially similar, but still with small differences), may end up with very different trajectories. — Daron Acemoglu, Georgy Egorov, and Konstantin Sonin, Institutional Change and Institutional…, 205

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines path dependence as historical shaping of institutional change, the chapter’s core analytic term.
• QUESTION: The excerpt stops at ‘two societies that start with’ — the comparison of same-start divergent outcomes is only half-stated here and worth chasing into the next passage.