Research Project

Between the outbreak of the French Revolution, 1789, and the Treaty of Vienna, 1815, Europe’s national economies were afflicted by 26 years of intensified mercantilist warfare. Thanks to generous funding from the Leverhulme Trust and support from LSE, a network of European economic historians has been formed as a logistically efficient and intellectually heuristic institution for an exercise in collaborative and comparative economic history. The network and its programme for research has been designed to expose contrasts in the economic outcomes and potential for long term development that flowed from this famous geopolitical conjuncture for several major European economies (including Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the Netherlands and Germany) their overseas colonies and for the evolution of the international economy.

The Lead Investigator (Patrick O’Brien) and Network Facilitator (Loraine Long) are located at LSE. They will coordinate the activities of a network of senior academics affiliated to universities in Amsterdam, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Munster, Oxford, Paris, and Pisa, through the medium of electronic communication, bilateral face-to-face conversations at host universities, seminars, two workshops and one conference.

The Network will transcend national, linguistic and disciplinary boundaries in order to write case studies for a major book. As well as national case studies and an introductory synthesis, that book aims to exemplify the insights obtained from reciprocal comparisons and the value of research in economics and history based upon collaboration. It should provide discussable answers to meta-questions concerned with the outcomes of early modern warfare, which are central for economics, sociology and geopolitical history.

Click below for more information:

• European Network
• Conferences