George Marten

Profound structural change defined the British and Irish economies of the nineteenth century. How did the institutions ordinary people relied on adapt to the new risks of sickness, unemployment and economic decline it created? Much of the burden fell on local institutions: the mutual associations, public relief bodies and co-operatives that communities either built themselves or were obliged to maintain.

I work at the intersection of economic and social history, combining archival sources with new spatial data to study how these institutions formed and coped under strain. My doctoral research examines friendly societies and the New Poor Law during the Lancashire Cotton Famine, the spread of friendly societies across Britain from 1680, and co-operative dairies in rural Ireland after the Great Famine.

My papers are available at my website: George Marten Website

EH221: Boom and Bust: Macroeconomic History of the Modern World

Seminar teacher

EH237: Research Methods in Economic History

Seminar teacher

EH4A1: Historical Analysis of Economic Change

Seminar teacher