2024/01/01 by Mark Harvey, Nicholas Draper · 1 voice
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth #American Constitutional Law and Politics #Historical Economic and Social Studies
paper · doi:10.1093/hwj/dbae008
openalex publication_date 2024/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
The recent republication of Eric Williams’ Capitalism and Slavery as a Penguin Modern Classic, along with the publication by two established economic historians, Maxine Berg and Pat Hudson, of their closely related book, marks a moment in British cultural life in which the salience of slavery is at a high point, after decades – centuries – of exclusion and evasion. Institutions, firms and families are scrambling to research and disclose their past entanglements in slavery, and in many cases to propose forms of reparation and restitution. Yet the re-inscription of slavery in British life has produced a fierce reaction, exemplified by the struggle over the National Trust but also evident in the highly personalized campaigns in the press against academics such as Professor Corinne Fowler at Leicester and Dr Jenny Bulstrode at UCL – campaigns in which a number of other historians have participated. The old order is not even dead; the new one has certainly not yet been born. We are a long way from the establishment of a new common sense. The more or less simultaneous appearance of the two books is certainly a symptom of a new or renewed appetite for exploring this contested history; the question is whether they are capable of overcoming the resistance of the economic history profession and disarming those who continue to argue against the significance of slavery to Britain.