The sweatshops of the consumer revolution. Economic growth, social inequality and material culture in Flanders and Brabant (c.18)

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• Bruno Blonde (Antwerp)
• Thursday 23 November 2023, 17:15-18:45
• Room 6, Faculty of History.

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All welcome

For decades historians have been occupied by the critical consumer transitions that marked the late early modern period. While initially coined as a “birth of a consumer society”, the newness, depth and the impact of the consumer changes in the eighteenth century have been qualified in decades of research. Eventually, the paradox of a “slow growth- and material culture-rich society” has been approached in the famous “industrious revolution thesis”. However, even this effort at peaceful reconciliation between moderate income growth and material wealth has been subjected to multiple criticisms. In this lecture, the critical approach to the consumer revolution will be pushed further. The much applauded consumer changes in the late early modern Low Countries account for an increased proletarianization, slow growth and accruing social inequality. On the basis of a comparative research into different urban trajectories across the Flemish and Brabantine urban network, the claim is that the consumer changes (the growing importance of affordable luxuries) were not a solution for a problem (stagnating real incomes and (s)low economic growth), but were a cause of them. In the absence of technological changes fostering productivity changes, the reorientation on “new luxuries” forcefully kept economic growth slow. On top of the global inequalities that were fostered by consumer changes, more attention needs to be paid to the local ramifications at the supply side of the consumer revolution. This will be illustrated by evidence for Brabant and Flanders, two economic core regions of the Low Countries.

This talk is part of the Core Seminar in Economic and Social History series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• AUB_Cambridge Seminars
• Core Seminar in Economic and Social History
• Department of Geography
• Economic and Social History Seminars
• History and Philosophy of Science long list
• Room 6, Faculty of History
• history

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