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Hoarding, Speculation, and the Public Order of the Market in France, End of the Eighteenth Century–1914

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2018

Alessandro Stanziani
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Abstract

France regulated competition through the gradual development of jurisprudence rooted in Old Regime practices of speculation and hoarding. This article aims to understand the reasons for this institutional legacy in order to determine if and how these norms could be adapted to the new phenomena of industrial concentration as they appeared at the turn of the nineteenth century.

I argue that French regulation of futures trades and speculation are aimed to stabilize and enhance markets and not to limit them, and that continuities in market and capitalism regulation were much more important than usually held.

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Articles
Information
Law & Social Inquiry , Volume 36 , Issue 3 , Summer 2011 , pp. 727 - 759
Copyright
Copyright © American Bar Foundation, 2011 

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Archival Documents

AN stands for Archives Nationales (National Archives, Paris).Google Scholar
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Numbers after F 12 or BB 18 indicate the consulted box.Google Scholar
AN BB 18 1677: competition and boulangerie.Google Scholar
AN BB 18 6603: illicit speculation.Google Scholar
AN BB 18 6604: illicit speculation.Google Scholar
AN BB 18 6605: illicit speculation.Google Scholar
AN BB18 6606: illicit speculation.Google Scholar
AN BB 18 6607: illicit speculation.Google Scholar
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