The Origin of Capitalism
A Longer View

While I'm still waiting for someone to do a treatise on the alchemical language employed by Marx to explain Capital and the magic the Capitalists/Bourgeoisie employ ("everything that is solid melts into air..."), I've had to settle instead with general clarifications. So in the meantime, TOoC was qu......more

There is an orthodox story about the development capitalism as an economic system that had been held at bay by the political order of European feudalism, but as the constraints weakened entrepreneurial bourgeois (as in urban dwelling) traders found that their business intensified, their profits incr......more

You will enjoy this book if you already have a familiarity with the orthodox view on how western society transitioned from feudalism to capitalism. You will enjoy this book more if you are already familiar with academic criticism of the orthodox view on the transition from feudalism to capitalism. Y......more

Wood recent death and my own interests in longer view of capitalism strangely overlapped and I revisited this gem of historiography. Wood and Brenner have been key in getting me to re-think some over-generalizations about capitalist teleology assumed in both liberal and Marxist circles. Many Marxist......more

I adored this book. It provides the reader with a perfect historiographical overview of various theories of capitalism. It does a wonderful job of discounting many traditional explanations for the origin of capitalism. EP Thompson is one of the few historians who doesn’t get too damaged by her revie......more