This book tries to decenter work on the history of capitalism by looking at the longue durée from the tenth century; at regions as diverse as Song China, South and South East Asia, Latin America and the Ottoman and Safavid Empires; and exploring the plurality of developments over this extended time and space. The authors argue against conventional accounts that locate the origins of capitalism solely within Europe and within the conjuncture of the industrial revolution. The essays emphasize historical conjunctures, flows of commodities, circulation of knowledge and personnel, the role of mercantile capital and small producers and stress throughout the necessity to think beyond present day national boundaries. The volume contends with clichés of Western exceptionalism to make a set of historical arguments about non-Western and interconnected economic developments across the globe, prior to the era of colonialism. It argues fundamentally that the multiple histories of capitalism can be better understood from a truly global perspective.
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Kaveh Yazdani, Dilip M. Menon
Part I: Major Debates and Controversies
1. Silver, Globalization, and Capitalism
Dennis O. Flynn
2. New World Slavery in the Capitalist World-Economy
Leonardo Marques
3. Russian Capitalism: Exceptionalism vs Global Labour Intensive Path, 1700-1914
Alessandro Stanziani
4. The Cambridge History of Capitalism: India
David Washbrook
5. Mysore's Pre-Colonial Potentialities of Capitalist Development and Industrialization
Kaveh Yazdani
6. Capitalism's Missing Link: What Happened to Southeast Asia?
Eric Tagliacozzo
7. The Birth of Capitalism in Global Perspective
Henry Heller
Part II: Case Studies in the Histories of Capitalisms
8. One-Off Capitalism in Song China, 960-1279 AD
Kent Deng
9. The First Capitalist Nation: The Development of Capitalism in England
Joseph Inikori
10. The Thin Line between Economic Dynamism and Social Stability: Regulation and Deregulation in Japan (twelfth to the nineteenth C.)
Masaki Nakabayashi
11. The View from Early Modern China: Capitalism and the Jingdezhen Ceramics Industry
Anne Gerritsen
12. Artisans, Guilds, and Capitalist Development in Cairo, 1600-1800
Nelly Hanna
13. Iranian Capitalism: Exceptionalism and Delayed Development
Rudi Matthee
Notes on Editors and Contributors
Index
