General background readings

Here are some useful works that are either of a general nature or to which we will repeatedly refer during the course.

Allen, Robert. The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective. Cambridge: CUP, 2009. Very good, also reasonably short and an easy read. Promotes a specific interpretation.

Allen, Robert. The Industrial Revolution. A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: OUP, 2017. A shorter, easy-to-read, somewhat broader summary of Allen's vision.

Asselain, Jean-Charles. Histoire économique de la France. Vol. 1. De l'Ancien Régime à la Première Guerre mondiale. Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1984. A nice overview. Not in-depth, and not reflecting the latest research, but concise, clear and very readable. Maddeningly, lacks any references, though there is a bibliography at the end of the second volume.

Berg, Maxine, and Pat Hudson. Slavery, Capitalism and the Industrial Revolution. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2023.

Crook, M. (ed.). Revolutionary France. Oxford: OUP, 2001. A volume of the Short Oxford History of France, covering 1788-1880. Useful background.

Crouzet, François. Britain Ascendant: Comparative Studies in Franco-British History. Cambridge: CUP, 1990. A collection of essays by this authority on both Britain and France, some dating back to the 1960s. Originally published in French c. 1985.

Doyle, William (ed.). Old Regime France. Oxford: OUP, 2001. This volume of the Short Oxford History of France has 9 short chapters on various aspects of economic, cultural, and political life. The article on the economy is by an expert on ancien régime finance, Joel Felix. Useful background.

Floud, Roderick and Paul Johnson (eds.), The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Britain, vol. I. Cambridge: CUP, 2004. CEHMB henceforth. A key reference work with chapters by authoritative contributors.

Floud, Roderick, Jane Humphries, and Paul Johnson (eds.), The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Britain, 2nd ed., vol. I. Cambridge: CUP, 2014. CEHMB henceforth. Chapters from both editions will be cited.

Heywood, Colin. The Development of the French Economy, 1750-1914. Cambridge: CUP, 1992. One of the Economic History Society's overview pamphlets, so very brief and providing a good introduction.

Horn, Jeff. The Path Not Taken. French Industrialization in the Age of Revolution. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006. Horn has an original and interesting perspective with a positive take on the French experience in this and the Privilege of Liberty book.

Horn, Jeff. Economic Development in Early Modern France. The Privilege of Liberty, 1650-1820. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2015.

Mokyr, Joel. The Enlightened Economy: An Economic History of Britain 1700-1850. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009. Only about Britain and seeking to make a particular point not always relevant to the topics here, but offers an up-to-date summary of the evidence and debate on a wide range of issues by a good writer and leading authority.

O'Brien, Patrick, and Caglar Keydar. Economic Growth in Britain and France 1780-1914. Two Paths to the Twentieth Century. London: Allen & Unwin, 1978. This 1978 book was in a way the foundation for the course, I think. From 1970 to 1990 Prof. O'Brien was here at Oxford.

Price, Roger. An Economic History of Modern France. London: Macmillan, 1981. A later version of his 1975 book. Not very up to date, but interesting detail and there isn't anything else like it in English. Price also has A Social History of Nineteenth-Century France.

Root, Hilton. The Fountain of Privilege. Political Foundations of Markets in Old Regime France and England.Berkeley CA: U. of California Press, 1994. Not written with much historical detail and the arguments can be rather abstract, but develops an overarching interpretive framework that is very interesting, and also is a good guide to other literature.