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Manufacture in Comparative Perspective: Six Studies. A Review Article

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Michael Sonenscher
Affiliation:
Middlesex Polytechnic, London

Abstract

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Type
Explanations in Economic History
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1985

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References

1 For a bibliography of the major works, see Chapman, S. D., The Cotton Industry in the Industrial Revolution (London, 1972).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 See, however, Goldthwaite, R. A., The Building of Renaissance Florence (Baltimore, 1980).Google Scholar The subject has attracted some interest among historians of design and architectural historians: See Verlet, P., L' Art du meuble á Paris au XVllle siècle (Paris, 1968);Google ScholarErikson, S., Louis Delanis, menuisier en sieges (1731–1792) (Paris, 1968);Google ScholarDemangeon, A. and Fortier, B., Les vaisseaux et les villes (Paris, 1978).Google Scholar Some information on the metal and cabinetmaking trades of Paris can be found in Monier, R., Le Faubourg Saint Antoine (1789–1815) (Paris, 1981),CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Raison-Jourde, F., La colonie auvergnate de Paris au XIX, siècle (Paris, 1976).Google Scholar

3 An exception might be made for printing. See Rychner, J., “Running a Printing House in 18th Century Switzerland: The Workshop of the Society typographique de Neuchatel,” The Library, 6th ser. 1 (1979), 124;CrossRefGoogle Scholaridem, A l'ombre des Lumières: coup d'oeil sur la main d'oeuvre de quelques imprmeres du XVIIIe, siècle,” Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century, 155 (1976), 19251955;Google ScholarDamton, R. C., The Business of Enlightenment (Cambridge, Mass., 1979),Google Scholar ch. 5; idem, The Literary Underground of the Old Regime (Cambridge, Mass., 1982), ch. 5.Google Scholar

4 The procedure derives from the classic studies by Hobsbawm, E. J., Labouring Men (London, 1964),Google Scholar esp. ch. 2, and Rude, G., The Crowd in History (London, 1964),Google Scholar esp. ch. 4. More recently, see Shelton, W. J., English Hunger and Industrial Disorders (London, 1973);Google ScholarStevenson, J., Popular Disturbances in England, 1700–1870 (London, 1979);Google ScholarMalcolmson, R. W., “A Set of Ungovernable People: The Kingswood Colliers in the Eighteenth Century,” in An Ungovernable People, Brewer, J. and Styles, J., eds. (London, 1980);Google ScholarDobson, C. R., Masters and Journeymen: A Prehistory of Industrial Relations, 1717–1800 (London, 1980);Google ScholarRule, J., The Experience of Labour in Eighteenth-Century Industry (London, 1981);Google ScholarBehagg, C., “Secrecy, Ritual, and Folk Violence: The Opacity of the Workplace in the First Half of the Nineteenth Century,” in Popular Culture and Custom in Nineteenth-Century England, Storch, R. D., ed. (London, 1982).Google Scholar The study of the culture of working people in other parts of Europe in the eighteenth century is not as rich. See, however, Burstin, H., “Conflitti sul lavoro e protesta annonaria a Pargi alla fine dell'ancien regime,” Studi storici, 19 (1978), 735–75;Google ScholarKaplan, S., “Reflexions sur la police du monde du travail, 1700–1815,” Revue historique, 529 (1979), 1778;Google ScholarRoche, D., Le peuple de Paris (Paris, 1981);Google Scholaridem, ed., Journal de ma vie: Jacques Louis Ménétra, compagnon vitrier (Paris, 1982);Google ScholarGressinger, A., Das symbolische Kapital der Ehre (Frankfurt, 1981).Google Scholar

5 Most imposingly by Landes, D. S., The Unbound Prometheus (London, 1969).Google Scholar See also Pollard, S., Peaceful Conquest: The Industrialisation of Europe, 1760–1970 (London, 1981).Google Scholar For a discussion of some of the conceptual problems associated with this historiographic tradition, see Tribe, K., Genealogies of Capitalism (London, 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 See, in particular, Mendels, F. F., “Proto-Industralization: The First Phase of the Industralization Process,” Journal of Economic History, 32 (1972), 241–61;CrossRefGoogle ScholarTilly, C., ed., Historical Studies of Changing Fertility (Princeton, 1978);Google ScholarKriedte, P., Medick, H. and Schlumbohm, J., Industrialization before Industrialization (London, 1981).Google Scholar Two special issues of the Revue du Nord, 61 :240 (1979), and 63:248 (1981),Google Scholar have been devoted to the subject. It was also discussed as one of the “A” themes at the Eighth International Economic Congress at Budapest in 1982. Some of the papers presented there will be published shortly. See also the special issue of Quaderni Storici, 52 (1983) on “Protoindustria.”Google Scholar

7 For a clear summary, see Pollard, , Peaceful Conquest, 6378.Google Scholar

8 See, in particular, Medick, H., “The Proto-Industrial Family Economy,” Social History, 3 (1976), 291315.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 See Chapman, S. D. and Chassagne, S., European Textile Printers in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1981);Google ScholarChassagne, S., Oberkampf: Un entrepreneur capitaliste au siècle des Lumières (Paris, 1980);Google ScholarCaspard, P., La fabrique neuve de Cortaillod (Paris, 1979);Google ScholarBergeron, L., Banquiers, négociants et manufacturiers parisiens du Directoire á l' Empire (Paris, 1978).Google Scholar

10 Thompson, E. P., “The Grid of Inheritance: A Comment,” in Family and Inheritance, Goody, J., Thirsk, J. and Thompson, E. P., eds. (London, 1976), 326–60;Google ScholarPubMedidem, Rough Music: Le charivari anglais,” Annales, 27a (1972), 285312.Google Scholar See also Neeson, J. M., “Common Right and Enclosure in Eighteenth-Century Northamptonshire” (Ph.D. diss., University of Warwick, 1977).Google Scholar A parallel reading of some of the works referred to in note 6 and Hill's, ChristopherSociety and Puritanism in Pre-Revolutionary England (London, 1964)Google Scholar might do much to illuminate the political history of rural capital accumulation in early modern England. More specifically, see Hudson, P., “Proto-industrialisation: The Case of the West Riding Wool Textile Industry in the 18th and Early 19th Centuries,” History Workshop Journal, 12 (1981), 3461.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 Some of these questions are taken up in Berg, M., Hudson, P. and Sonenscher, M., eds., Manufacture in Town and Country before the Factory (London, 1983), “Introduction.”CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12 The original thesis was reproduced (with footnotes and bibliography) by the University of Lille III in 1975.

13 There has been much discussion of Thompson's work, much of it derived from the work of Louis Althusser. This is not the place for consideration of a discussion upon which, to this writer, the last word was said by Mason, T., History Workshop Journal, 7 (1979), 224–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also, for some methodological perspectives on the relationship between workers and capital, Tronti, Mario, Operai a capitale (Milan, 1970),Google Scholar translated into French as Ouvriers et capital (Paris, 1977), with a useful bibliographical introduction by Yann Moulier.Google Scholar

14 See the works referred to in note 9.

15 The point of departure for the study of this process remains Marx, K., Capital, Vol. I,Google Scholar Pt. VIII. See also Linebaugh, P., “Karl Marx, the Theft of Wood and Working-Class Composition: A Contribution to the Current Debate,” Crime and Social Justice, 6 (Fall-Winter, 1976).Google Scholar

16 Taylor, G. V., “Non-capitalist Wealth and the Origins of the French Revolution,” American Historical Review, 72 (1967), –96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For a summary of the (somewhat limited) orthodoxy which this has produced, see Doyle, W., Origins of the French Revolution (London, 1980), Pt. I.Google Scholar

17 Price, J., Capital and Credit in British Overseas Trade: The View from the Chesapeake, 1700–1776 (London, 1980), ch. 4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 See Crouzet, F., ed., Capital Formation in the Industrial Revolution (London, 1972).Google Scholar Some consideration of the problems encountered by one circle of small merchants, silk and wool factors, minor landowners, and manufacturers in the accumulation of wealth is given in Sonenscher, M., “Royalists and Patriots: Nimes and Its Hinterland in the Eighteenth Century” (Ph.D. thesis, University of Warwick, 1978).Google Scholar

19 On the livret, see Kaplan, , “Réflexions sur Ia police,”Google Scholar and Sonenscher, M., “Work and Wages in Eighteenth-Century Paris,” in Berg, Hudson, AND Sonenscher, , eds., Manufacture in Town and Country.Google Scholar

20 Some of the most interesting considerations of these questions can be found in Culture del lavoro,” Quaderni storici, 47 (1981);Google ScholarLinebaugh, P., “Labour History without the Labour Process: A Note on John Gast and His Times,” Social History, 7 (1982), 319–28;CrossRefGoogle ScholarPrice, R., “The Labour Process and Labour History,” Social History, 8 (1983), 5775;CrossRefGoogle ScholarReddy, W., “Skeins, Scales, Discounts, Steam, and Other Objects of Crowd Justice in Early French Textile Mills,” Comparative Studies in Society and History, 21:2 (1979), 204–13;CrossRefGoogle Scholaridem, Modes de paiement et contrôle du travail dans les filatures de coton en France, 1750–1848,” Revue du Nord, 63 (1981), 135–46;CrossRefGoogle ScholarRancière, J., La nuit des prolétaires (Paris, 1981);Google ScholarBruland, R., “Industrial Conflict as a Source of Technical Innovation: Three Cases,” Economy and Sociery, 2 (1982), 91121.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21 See Hobsbawn, E. J., The Age of Revolution, Mentor Edition (London, 1964), p. 250, although the historical problem is rather elided in his note. This writer would welcome the opportunity to collaborate with other historians on this project.Google Scholar

22 See note 9 above, and Ellis, G., Napoleon's Continental Blockade, The Case of Alsace (Oxford, 1981).Google Scholar

23 Gilboy, E. W., “Demand as a Factor in the Industrial Revolution,” in The Causes of the Industrial Revolution in England, Hartwell, R. M., ed. (London, 1967).Google Scholar

24 Brewer, J., McKendrick, N. and Plumb, J. H., The Birth of a Consumer Society: The Commercialisation of Eighteenth Century England (London, 1983).Google Scholar

25 Some reflections on the history of consumption can be found in Perrot, P., Les dessus et les dessous de la bourgeoisie, Une histoire du vêtement au XIXe siècle (Paris, 1981).Google Scholar See also the stimulating essay by Sennett, R., The Fall of Public Man (London, 1977).Google Scholar

26 The phrases are taken from Samuel, R., “The Workshop of the World,” History Workshop Journal, 3 (1977), 672.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

27 The work of historians of science contains several suggestions worth further exploration. For a wide-ranging bibliographic review, see Schaffer, S., “Natural Philosophy and Public Spectacle in the 18th Century,” History of Science (1983), 143.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

28 Sewell, W., Work and Revolution in France: The Language of Labor from the Old Régime to 1848 (London, 1980);CrossRefGoogle ScholarJones, G. Stedman, “The Language of Chartism,” in The Chartist Experience, Epstein, J. and Thompson, D., eds. (London, 1982), 358.Google Scholar

29 Thale, M., ed., The Autobiography of Francis Place (London, 1972), 136–37.Google Scholar

30 Agulhon, M., Pénitents e1 Francs-Maçons de 1'ancienne Provence (Paris, 1968).Google Scholar It is surprising that historians of Britain in the eighteenth century, that age of “clubbability,” have not made more use of the insights of this major work. An outline of the possibilities of this kind of investigation can be found in Morris, R. J., “Voluntary societies and British Urban Elites, 1780–1850: An Analysis,” Historical Journal, 26 (1983), 95118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Inkster, I. and Morrell, J., eds., Metropolis and Province: Science in British Culture, 1780–1850 (London, 1983).Google Scholar

31 Published in the Revue historique, 212 (1954), 239–8. Predictably, this fundamental study—and the tradition of prosopographical economic history, from Luthy to Carrière, which it inaugurated in France—has been greatly neglected by British historians of eighteenth-century French society.Google Scholar