First published in 1909 and reissued in 1910, J. A. Hobson’s The Industrial System provides a complex analysis of distribution and consumption. Offering a critique of contemporary capitalism whilst accepting the superiority of the free market, the book includes an exploration of areas such as cost and surplus, supply and demand and the labour movement. This is an important work by one of the most important economic thinkers of the twentieth century, which will be of particular interest to modern economic historians.

In recent years, scholars from a variety of disciplines have addressed many perplexing questions about the Industrial Revolution in all its aspects. Understandably, economics has become the focal point for these efforts as professional economists have sought to resolve some of the controversies surrounding this topic. This collection contains ten of the best articles written by economists on the subject of the Industrial Revolution ... Among the questions discussed are the causes for the pre-eminence of Britain, the roles of the inputs for growth (capital, labor, technical progress), the importance of demand factors, the relation between agricultural progress and the Industrial Revolution, and the standard of living debate. The essays demonstrate that the application of fresh viewpoints to the literature has given us a considerable new body of data at our disposal, making it possible to test commonly held hypotheses. In addition, this new data has enabled economists to apply a more rigorous logic to the thinking about the Industrial Revolution, thus sharpening many issues heretofore blurred by slipshod methodology and internal inconsistencies.-- Back cover.

First published in 1992, this volume brings together contemporary studies and reviews the research which established the study of networks as an area in its own right. By looking at the foundations of industrial networks and analysing network methodology and modelling, this book offers an integrated and coherent approach to the whole area. Covering small group analysis, network change processes and implications for business strategy, and presenting new ways to exploit inter-organisational relationships in the face of change, it tackles key issues with important implications for the future. This book will be of interest to students of economics and business.

First published in 1988, this book analyses the changes that took place in the economic organisation of the British construction industry throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, in particular considering its social and economic structure and examining the causes of its poor industrial record. Michael Ball describes how the major firms survived the economic slump between 1973 and 1982 - when construction workloads collapsed - by substantially restructuring their operations, relationships with clients, workforces and subcontractors. Detailed attention is paid to construction firms, the workers they employ, the influence of trade unionism and the role of other agencies in the building process. Reissued at a particularly challenging time for the British construction industry, this relevant and practical title will be of value to students and academics of economics and social change, as well as those on courses for construction professionals.

First published in 1979, The Transformation of England discusses the creation in late eighteenth century England of the industrial system and thereby the present world. Professor Mathias poses questions about the nature of industrialization, social change and historical explanation, issues that are his principal scholarly concern. This series of essays is divided into two groups. The first group of essays focuses upon general themes such as the 'uniqueness' in Europe of the industrial revolution, capital formation, taxation, the growth of skills, science and technical change, leisure and wages, and diagnoses of poverty. In the second section, Professor Mathias focuses on the social structure in the eighteenth century, considering the industrialization of brewing, coinage, agriculture and the drink industries, advances in public health and the armed forces, British and American public finance in the War of Independence, Dr Johnson and the business world.

This edited collection, first published in 1991, focuses on the commercial relations, marketing structures and development of consumption that accompanied early industrial expansion. The papers examine aspects of industrial structure and work organisation, including women’s work, and highlight the conflict and compromise between work traditions and the emergence of a market culture. With an overarching introduction providing a background to European manufacturing, this title will be of particular interest to students of social and economic history researching early industrial Europe and the concurrent emergence of a material, consumer culture.

The Market and Its Critics, first published in 1988, considers the reaction of socialist writers to the growth of the market economy in nineteenth century Britain, and examines in detail the diverse elements of the critique which they formulated. Dr Thompson looks at the theoretic and thematic continuities and discontinuities over the century, structuring his study around the idea of a changing socialist response to the market economy. Much of the literature in question is comprehensive, perceptive and acute. However, the writers invariably discounted the possibility of the market playing a role in a future socialist or communist commonwealth. The solutions they posited to the problem were inapplicable to the increasingly industrial economy of the time. It was this that left their writing vulnerable to attack, and which had profound consequences both for the fate of the socialist political economy in nineteenth century Britain and its subsequent evolution in the twentieth century.

First published in 1985, this book offered a fresh analysis of the problems faced by the Soviet economy by focussing on the key issues in the economic planning system. David Dyker considers the available options for reform during the 1980s and the most likely developments. Discussing the origins of the Soviet economic planning system and the theories which founded it, previous attempts to reform the organisational structure and the particular problem of agriculture, Dyker presents a picture of an increasingly bleak future for the Soviet economy. This is a comprehensive title written by a renowned expert on the Soviet economy, which will be of particular value to students and academics researching the political and economic development and history of the Soviet Union.