| Abstract: |
Richard Tawney (1880-1962), who taught at the London School of Economics from
1917 to 1949, was unquestionably one of the very most important economic
historians that England has ever produced: so much so, indeed, that the era of
his major research and publications, 1540 - 1640, has justly come to be known
as âÃÂÃÂTawneyâÃÂÃÂs CenturyâÃÂÃÂ. Those publications,
and the debates that they provoked, concern the origins or roots of modern
capitalism and (implicitly) capitalist entrepreneurship that were supposed to
have been established in this century. Though the roots of those economic
developments, in particular those leading to more modern forms of industrial
capitalism, may indeed lie in that century, nevertheless the main thesis of
this study is that most of their positive fruits are instead to be found in
the ensuing century of 1640 - 1740, the century preceding the advent of the
modern Industrial Revolution. TawneyâÃÂÃÂs seminal scholarship, towards
these ends, was concerned with two major issues. The first considered in this
study is his 1926 monograph: Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, which in
part was designed to promote, in the English-speaking world, Max
WeberâÃÂÃÂs famous thesis (1905) on âÃÂÃÂThe Protestant Ethic
and the Spirit of CapitalismâÃÂÃÂ. Both works focused on how three
elements of one Protestant sect in particular, the Calvinists (from 1536),
came to influence so deeply that Protestant Ethic and new ethos of modern
capitalism: Predestination, the Calling, and âÃÂÃÂWorldly
AsceticismâÃÂÃÂ. The significance of this form of Protestantism in
England is that Calvinists and other Non-Conformists or Dissenters, those who
refused to conform to the Church of England after the 1660 royalist
Restoration, constituted about one half of the known scientists, innovators,
and entrepreneurs from the later 17th century and through the Industrial
Revolution era (1760-1820), though constituting only 5 percent of the
population. The debate concerns the roles of their restricted (legislated)
minority status and of schools and superior educational systems that they had
to establish, but also the applicability of the Weber-Tawney thesis, in
explaining their superior economic performance. TawneyâÃÂÃÂs second
major issue was that of âÃÂÃÂagrarian capitalismâÃÂÃÂ, along
with the supposed âÃÂÃÂrise of the gentryâÃÂÃÂ: involving the
transfer of vast amounts of land from the old aristocracy, the crown and
church together, and finally the free-holding yeomanry into the hands of a
non-aristocratic upper class who were far more predisposed and able to engage
in profit-maximizing agriculture, especially through enclosures and the
technology of the New Husbandry. But if Tawney dates this shift from Henry
VIIIâÃÂÃÂs Dissolution of the Monasteries, in 1536, this study contends
that the real shift, but certainly a major shift, to âÃÂÃÂagrarian
capitalismâÃÂÃÂ, involving enclosures and the New Husbandry, again came
only after the 1660s. To provide a contrast to TawneyâÃÂÃÂs work, this
study examines two alternative theses on the origins of modern industrial
capitalism within TawneyâÃÂÃÂs century (1540-1640): (1) Earl
HamiltonâÃÂÃÂs thesis of âÃÂÃÂProfit InflationâÃÂÃÂ, one
fully endorsed by Keynes; and (2) John NefâÃÂÃÂs âÃÂÃÂEarly
Industrial Revolution in Tudor-Stuart EnglandâÃÂÃÂ. The Hamilton thesis
is rejected in this study, with the contention that its true importance was to
inspire NefâÃÂÃÂs counter-thesis: on the decisive shift from wood and
charcoal fuels to coal fuels, which in turn required very major technological
changes (in furnace designs), which in turn led to major increases in
industrial scale, and (for Nef) to true âÃÂÃÂindustrial
capitalismâÃÂÃÂ. This study, noting the importance of
WrigleyâÃÂÃÂs similar thesis on a shift from an organic (wood-based) to
an inorganic (coal-based) industrial economy, supports the essence of the Nef
thesis âÃÂàbut only for the period after 1640 (with new data).
Finally, this study considers two other related changes so necessary for the
development of early-modern capitalism, in this era: the development of the
Full Rigged or Atlantic Ship (but from the 1450s) and the overseas joint-stock
trading companies. Again, their major impact came after 1660, with the
âÃÂÃÂNew ColonialismâÃÂà(Hobsbawm) or âÃÂÃÂCommercial
RevolutionâÃÂà(Davis). The study also considers the history of the
English joint stock companies, from the first joint-stock company, in overseas
trade (the Muscovy Company of 1553) to the Bubble Act of 1720, which
restricted their formation until 1825. Also included is their role in the
so-called âÃÂÃÂFinancial RevolutionâÃÂàfrom 1694 to 1757
(âÃÂÃÂPelhamsâÃÂÃÂs ConversionâÃÂàof the national debt). |