Credit and Debt in Eighteenth-Century England: An Economic History of Debtors’ Prisons (Perspectives in Economic and Social History)

Synopsis

Throughout the eighteenth century hundreds of thousands of men and women were cast into prison for failing to pay their debts. This apparently illogical system where debtors were kept away from their places of work remained popular with creditors into the nineteenth century even as Britain witnessed industrialisation, market growth, and the increasing sophistication of commerce, as the debtors’ prisons proved surprisingly effective. Due to insufficient early modern currency, almost every exchange was reliant upon the use of credit based upon personal reputation rather than defined collateral, making the lives of traders inherently precarious as they struggled to extract payments based on little more than promises. This book shows how traders turned to debtors’ prisons to give those promises defined consequences, the system functioning as a tool of coercive contract enforcement rather than oppression of the poor. Credit and Debt demonstrates for the first time the fundamental contribution of debt imprisonment to the early modern economy and reveals how traders made use of existing institutions to alleviate the instabilities of commerce in the context of unprecedented market growth. This book will be of interest to scholars and researchers in economic history and early modern British history.

Copyright:

2021

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

ISBN-13:

9780429647925

Related ISBNs:

9780429028212, 9780367514297, 9780367514297, 9780367137113, 9780367137113

Publisher:

Taylor and Francis

Date of Addition:

06/19/20

Copyrighted By:

Alexander Wakelam

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

History, Nonfiction, Business and Finance, Social Studies

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.