Cambridge University Press, Economic History Association The Journal of Economic History

Economic History Association
Economic Growth in England Before the Industrial Revolution: Some Methodological Issues
Author(s): Richard M. Hartwell
Source: The Journal of Economic History, Vol. 29, No. 1, The Tasks of Economic History
(Mar., 1969), pp. 13-31
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Economic History Association
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Economic Growth in England Before
the Industrial Revolution: Some
Methodological Issues
T HIS paper, as presented at the Fourth Congress of the Interna-

tional Economic History Association, is the first of four con-
cerned with economic growth in England before the industrial
revolution, in what, for purposes of brevity and analytical distinc-
tion, I propose to call preindustriall England."' It might be prudent
for this period to talk of "economic change" ("the movement of eco-
nomic processes over time")2 rather than "economic growth" ("the
growth of output per head of population"),3 because change does
not necessarily imply growth, and because, for the thousand years
which preceded English industrialization, the historians are un-
certain about the direction and duration of the secular trend of the
economy over long periods, although they seem to have identified
some periods of growth as well as some periods of decline. My aim
is to make explicit the problems implicit in three questions: What
type of economy-what economic system-existed in England in
the centuries between the Norman Conquest and the industrial
revolution? What economic change occurred in these centuries? Did
such change compound into a definite trend or trends? On economic
systems there is a large historical literature which has established
both functional and chronological criteria which are still widely
used. These distinctions, as they were defined for example by
Sombart,4 differentiated systems in terms of their spirit, organiza
and technique, and established a chronology of economic stages
(primitive, manorial, guild, mercantilist, capitalist) on the basis of
changes in the criteria. Or distinctions between systems concen-
trated on industry, leading to the definition also, for example
1 The other papers are entitled: "Economic Growth in England, 1550-1750";

"Capitalism: A Critical and Historiographical Survey"; and "The Use of Economic
Theory in the Economic History of Preindustrial Economy."
2 S. Kuznets, Economic Change (London: Heinemann, 1954), p. vii.
3 W. A. Lewis, The Theory of Economic Growth (London: Allen and Unwin,
1955), p. 9.
4 W. Sombart, Die Ordnung des Wirtschaftslebens (Leipzig: Enzyklopidie der
Rechts- und Staatswissenschaft, 1925); and "Capitalism," Encyclopaedia of the
Social Sciences, vol. III (New York: Macmillan, 1930), pp. 195-208.
13
14 Richard M. Hartwell
by Ashley, of a stage process (household, handicraft, domestic,
factory) .5 I leave aside-for another paper-a critical account of
historians' comparative analyses of economic systems, and concen-
trate here on the problem of economic change and economic trends.6
To what extent was the preindustrial economy static, changing, or
growing? Was change, or growth, continuous or discontinuous, secu-
lar or cyclical? What was the link between preindustrial and industrial
economy? What very long-term forces in preindustrial England led
to the industrial revolution?7 What was the pattern of change-the
trend-over short and long periods? Did the industrial revolution
mark a revolutionary discontinuity in history compared with what
preceded it, and with earlier discontinuities?
These are large and largely unanswered questions. To an important

extent they hinge on the writings on two great discontinuities: that
of the historians on "the rise of capitalism," and that of the econ-
omists on "economic growth." The rise of capitalism dates from
some undefined time before the eighteenth century; economic
growth dates unambiguously from the industrial revolution of the
eighteenth century. The literatures on both capitalism and growth
are large, but almost unrelated.8 The growth literature is by econ-
omists and is mainly post-1945; insofar as it is historically based,
it assumes that capitalism was the economic system of the developed
countries during their growth and that growth began with the
industrial revolution in England. "The modern economic world,"
Gill writes, "can be said to have been born in England in the second
half of the eighteenth century."9 To economists who look at history,
5 W. J. Ashley, The Economic Organization of England (London: Longmans,

Green & Co., 1914), pp. 35-6; see also, C. Bucher, Industrial Evolution (New York:
Henry Holt and Co., 1901), pp. 89 ff.
0 For an account of obvious confusion about the term "capitalism," see R. H. Hi
ton, "Capitalism-What's in a Name?," Past and Present, 1 (1952).
7 By very long-term here I mean several centuries. For a shorter-term background
of the industrial revolution, see: R. M. Hartwell (Ed.), The Causes of the Industrial
Revolution in England (London: Methuen, 1967); E. L. Jones (Ed.), Agriculture
and Economic Growth in England 1650-1815 (London: Methuen, 1967), and M. W.
Flinn, Origins of the Industrial Revolution (London: Longmans, 1966).
8 See, however, B. Higgins, Economic Development: Principles, Problems and
Politics (rev. ed.; London: Constable, 1968), p. 161, who declares, "the acceleration
of economic development in Europe after 1500 . . . culminated in the industrial
Revolution . . . [and] has been labeled 'the rise of capitalism."'
9 R. T. Gill, Economic Development: Past and Present (Englewood Cliffs, N
Prentice-Hall, 1963). p. 40.
Economic Growth in England 15
the significant turning point was the sustained and substantial in-
crease in per capita output which came with the industrial revolu-
tion; it was the radical change in the technology and organization
of English industry which marked the beginnings of economic
growth. The literature on capitalism is mainly by historians, and
much of it was written before 1939.10 As a central subject in economic
history, the rise of capitalism has occupied the attention of a formid-
able list of distinguished historians, both in England and abroad:
Cunningham, Ashley, Tawney, Lipson, Dobb, Weber, Sombart,
Pirenne, See, and Hamilton, to mention but a few." These historians
recognized two phenomena-the rise of capitalism and the indus-
trial revolution-but reckoned the latter to be a later stage in the
development of the former, and were therefore more interested in
the transition from precapitalist to capitalist economy than from
early to industrial capitalism. And although they distinguished
earlier commercial and financial capitalisms from industrial capital-
ism,'2 it was only a distinction of degree, usually measured by capital
intensity. "The phenomena of the sixteenth century are reproduced,"
wrote Pirenne of the nineteenth century, "but with tenfold inten-
sity."'13 The emphasis was on capital and individualism-as Cun-
ningham argued, "capital has been the main instrument in material
progress" and "the intervention of capital eventually brought about
an entire reconstruction of the social system of Western Europe-'l4
-and this emphasis, stemming originally from the classical eco-
nomists' theories of economic progress,'5 biased historians both into
10 See, however, M. Dobb, Studies in the Development of Capitalism (London:

Routledge, 1946) and D. Landes (Ed.), The Rise of Capitalism (New York: Mac-
millan, 1966).
11 W. Cunningham, The Progress of Capitalism in England (Cambridge, [Eng.]:
The University Press, 1916); Ashley, Economic Organization; R. H. Tawney, Religion
and the Rise of Capitalism (London: John Murray, 1926); E. Lipson, The Economic
History of England (London: A. & C. Black, 1931); Dobb, Development of Capi-
talism; M. Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (London: Allen
and Unwin, 1930); W. Sombart, The Quintessence of Capitalism (London: E. P.
Dutton, 1915); H. Pirenne, "The Stages in the Social History of Capitalism," Ameri-
can Historical Review, XIX (1913-14); H. See, Modern Capitalism: Its Origin and
Evolution (London: Noel Douglas, 1928); E. J. Hamilton, "American Treasure and
the Rise of Capitalism (1500-1700)," Economica, IX (1929).
12 For example, See, Modern Capitalism, chs. V, VI, and VII.
13 Pirenne, "Stages of Capitalism," pp. 500-15.
14 Cunningham, Progress of Capitalism, p. 21, and Western Civilization, Vol. II
(Cambridge, [Eng.]: The University Press, 1913), p. 162.
15 To the classical economists, economic progress depended on, first, the rate of
growth of population, and, second, capital accumulation which allowed technological
improvements and greater productivity. The emphasis on capital continued in eco.
nomic as well as in historical literature. See, for example, A. K. Cairncross, "The
accepting a simple capital-induced growth model of the rise of

capitalism and of the industrial revolution, and also into assuming
that such growth occurred in a certain philosophical and organiza-
tional context which encouraged and allowed increasing freedom
for the capitalist to accumulate and use capital. The historians,
therefore, were preoccupied with the sources of capital and with
the growth of the capitalist ethic and of laissez-faire. And when
after 1945 the economists turned their attention once more to eco-
nomic growth, after a century of neglect of its problems, they were
undoubtedly influenced, in the formulation of theory and policy, if
not specifically, at least in their general historical education, by the
historians' almost universal identification of economic growth with
capital accumulation.
But if the historians dated the modern economic world from the
beginnings of capitalism, both dating and causation varied from
historian to historian. To Pirenne, the activities of merchants in the
twelfth century began the rise of capitalism in Europe, and his
thesis has been applied to England by Stephenson."6 Weber for
Europe, and Tawney for England,'7 argued that Protestantism, the
result of the sixteenth-century Reformation, provided "a social ethos,
a set of beliefs which both permitted and encouraged the evolution
of modern capitalism."'"8 Hamilton argued that monetary inflation,
the ultimate result of the influx into Europe of American treasure,
caused a profit inflation which generally enabled rapid capital ac-
cumulation.'9 See argued for Europe, "The most fruitful sources o
modern capitalism, without doubt, have been the great maritime
discoveries," and Cunningham for England, "the period which fol-
lowed the discovery of the New World" offered "an unprecedented
opportunity for the formation of capital."20 These explanations of
Place of Capital in Economic Progress," Factors in Economic Development (London:

Allen and Unwin, 1962), for a skeptical voice.
16 H. Pirenne, Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe (London: Kegan
Paul, 1936), p. 49; C. Stephenson, Borough and Town (Cambridge: Harvard Uni-
versity Press, 1933), pp. 205 ff.
17 Weber, Protestant Ethic and Tawney, Religion and Capitalism.
18 M. J. Kitch (Ed.), Capitalism and the Reformation (London: Longmans, 1967),
p. xiv.
19 E. J. Hamilton, "American Treasure and the Rise of Capitalism (1500-1700)";
"Profit Inflation and the Industrial Revolution, 1751-1800," Quarterly Journal of
Economics, LVI (1941-42); "The History of Prices before 1750," XIe Congres In-
ternational des Sciences Historiques, Rapports, Vol. I (Uppsala, 1960).
20 S6e, Modem Capitalism, p. 41; Cunningham, The Growth of Industry and
the rise of capitalism are well known and variously criticized; and
there are many others which vary in their attribution of responsibility
for capitalism, from the Crusades to the slave trade, from the rise of
a money economy to the rise of the middle classes. My aim here is
not to be comprehensive about the historiography of the origins of
capitalism, but only to point out that explanations of capitalism have
in common a dating, though varied, which long precedes the indus-
trial revolution; they tend also to be explanations in terms of factors
which operated widely but slowly; they tend to see capitalism as a
European phenomenon; they are concerned with explaining a
variety of factors but rarely, if ever, with explaining rates of grow
of total output; their emphasis is on organization rather than on
growth; they explain both "the rise of capitalism" and "the industrial
revolution."
The link between capitalism and industrialization, however, is
weakly defined, and the former has been used to explain the latter
only very generally as the result of an inevitable and intensifying
capital accumulation. Thus See wrote of the eigthteenth century:
"The accumulations of capital are becoming so considerable . .. that
the way is fast being prepared for further transformations. "2' Most
historians agreed with Marx that the industrial revolution repre-
sented "a transition from an early and still immature stage of
capitalism."22 To the historians the great discontinuity of modern
economic history was-and is?-that which marked the rise of
capitalism, even though their definitions of capitalism varied and
their efforts to locate and explain the discontinuity conflicted.23 But
insofar as the historians saw their own world as maturely capitalistic,
and explained the rise of capitalism and the industrial revolution as
stages in a growth process leading to mature capitalism, they were
seeking the long-term causes of economic growth, and, also, the
long-term causes of the industrial revolution. It is significant, in-
Commerce in Modern Times: Laissez Faire (Cambridge, [Eng.]: The University

Press, 1925), p. 873.
21 See, Modern Capitalism, p. 84.
22 Dobb, Development of Capitalism, p. 19.
23 This discontinuity is also linked with cultural change. As D. Herlihy writes:
"Some historians have dared to see in these transformations of the central Middle
Ages a major turning point in Western history, marking the emergence of ideals,
attitudes and traditions of behaviour which have since remained a permanent part
of our 'modern civilization,"' Medieval Culture and Society (New York: Harper,
1968), p. xiii.
deed, that when the historians turned specifically to explain indus-

trialization rather than capitalism, their explanations duplicated;
what had explained the rise of capitalism also explained the indus-
trial revolution.24 And if the historians' search for the origins of
capitalism can now be seen, at least partly, as efforts to trace the
origins of modern economic growth, they are relevant for an under-
standing of the industrial revolution. If the historians' efforts were
partly to investigate "what early capitalism developed into," these
same efforts may be useful to explain "what industrialization de-
veloped from."
It is not my intention here to discuss discontinuities other than
the industrial revolution. Modern history has long been distinguished
from ancient history, not merely by a conventional and convenient
chronology, but also by those important "events" which fill the early
chapters of histories of modern Europe: the growth of towns, the
rise of new industries, the geographical discoveries and the expansion
of international trade, the rise of nation states, the Renaissance and
the Reformation, etc. Such events do seem to impose an obvious
pattern on history, and one which is discussed below. It is interesting
to note here, however, that even the discontinuity of the Dark Ages
is now challenged. Thus Latouche has written recently: "Studied in
the spirit of realism, the phase of human history stretching from the
fourth to the eleventh century turns out to be unusually rich in
promise and even in actual achievement. It brought into being a
new Europe, unknown to the ancient world, facing outward to the
Atlantic and the North Sea, and from this new Europe the western
economy took its pattern."25 However, belief in a crucial earlier dis-
continuity, whenever it occurred, has made many historians suspi-
cious of the very existence of the later discontinuity of the industrial
revolution, in spite of its economic and statistical obviousness. Hence
the discovery of earlier "revolutions"-industrial by Carus-Wilson
and Nef, commercial by De Roover;26 hence the smoothing-out of
24 See R. M. Hartwell, "The Causes of the Industrial Revolution: An Essay in

Methodology," Economic History Review, 2d ser. XVIII (1965).
25 R. Latouche, The Birth of Western Economy: Economic Aspects of the Dark
Ages (London: Methuen, 1967), p. 309.
26 E. M. Carus-Wilson, "An Industrial Revolution in the Thirteenth Century,"
Economic History Review, XI (1941); J. U. Nef, "The Progress of Technology and
the Growth of Large Scale Industry in Great Britain, 1540-1640," Economic History
Review, V (1934); and R. De Roover, "The Commercial Revolution of the Thir-
teenth Century," Bulletin of the Business Historical Society, XVI (1942).
the long-term economic growth curve to deny the very existence of

the industrial revolution and to argue for "an evolution of industry"
rather than "a revolution which produced industrialization."27 How-
ever, in the context of a world today preoccupied with the problems
of economic growth in the underdeveloped economies, it is not
difficult to reassert the reality and importance of the discontinuity
of the industrial revolution. And the emergence in recent growth
literature of a new concept-modernization, the complete restruc-
turing of the economic, political, and social life of communities28_
has further underlined, both for the historians of developed coun-
tries and for the economists of underdeveloped countries, the need
for a great discontinuity to produce industrialization and a sustained
growth of per capita income. There is no necessary conflict between
historians of capitalism and economists of growth, but the historians
must recognize that the industrial revolution marked the great dis-
continuity of modern history (perhaps the greatest discontinuity in
the whole of history)29 and one that cannot be treated as a residual
result of "the rise of capitalism." Historians seeking the economic
origins of the modern world must concentrate their attention on that
economic growth, obviously long in the making, which culminated
in the industrial revolution, rather than on an obscurely defined,
undated and immeasurable rise of capitalism.
II
I have argued elsewhere that although the industrial revolution

was a great discontinuity, it was not one which could be identified
by a sharply dated turning point or take-off, as measured by macro-
economic indexes.30 However, over the century 1750 to 1850 the
British economy changed radically, in structure and in rate of
growth: The proportion of national income devoted to investment
probably doubled; the percentage of the total workforce employed
27 For example, N. S. B. Gras entitled his history of industry, Industrial Evolution

(Oxford University Press, 1930), while admitting (p. 90) "in the whole recorded part
of industrial history there has apparently occurred but one great break in evolution-
ary development. That break is called the Industrial Revolution."
28 See, for example, C. E. Black, The Dynamics of Modernization: A Study in
Comparative History (New York: Harper and Row, 1967), which has an extensive
bibliographical essay (pp. 175-99) on modernization.
29 A clear recognition of this can be found in C. Cipolla, The Economic History
of World Population (London: Penguin, 1962).
80 Hartwell, Causes of the Industrial Revolution, Introduction.
in manufacturing industry and services reached modern proportions;

and the rates of growth of population and of output (absolute and
per capita) accelerated to rates which had never before occurred
in history (except, perhaps, for very short periods).," To modern
eyes, the macroeconomic effect was gradual, and real income per
head grew slowly, perhaps only doubling during the first century of
industrialization. Such sustained growth, however, was remarkable
and without precedent in the preindustrial economy. It is important,
therefore, to inquire into the nature of growth before the industrial
revolution and how it related to the more spectacular industrial
growth.
This relationship can be explained, generally, in three ways: The
first explanation is genuinely revolutionary. After minimal growth,
with setbacks, for several centuries during which the English econ-
omy was held in a vicious circle32 of low incomes, low demand and
low savings, low investment and capital deficiency, and thus very
slow or no growth, one or more of the major growth variables
changed significantly over a short period, with revolutionary effects.
Either there was a radical improvement in technology, and/or a
sudden increase in the rate of growth of population, and/or a massive
increase in investment, and/or a revolutionary change in the context
of enterprise. Rostow, for example, explained the industrial revolu-
tion as the result of a substantial and rapid increase in investment.33
However, the assumptions, either of a previously near-static econ-
omy, or of significant changes over a short period in the eighteenth
century in one or more of the growth variables cannot be sustained
realistically. There had been growth in England before the industrial
revolution so that the economy in 1750 was advanced rather than
backward, even by modern criteria;34 and those tentative measure-
31 See P. Deane and W. A. Cole, British Economic Growth, 1688-1959 (Cam-

bridge University Press, 1962), for detailed statistics, which, although criticized,
have been accepted generally as indicating long-term trends in the structure and
output of the British economy since the late sixteenth century.
32 Many obstacles to growth are both a cause and consequence of poverty, so that
there is "a vicious circle" which perpetuates the low rate of growth. See, for example,
R. Nurkse, Problems of Capital Formation in Underdeveloped Countries (Oxford:
Basil Blackwell, 1953), p. 5, where he shows that low real incomes account for both
low savings and lack of investment incentives on the one hand, and low demand and
low investment on the other.
33 W. W. Rostow, "The Take-off into Self-sustained Growth," The Economic Jour-
nal, LXVI (1956), p. 261.
34 On the development of the English economy by 1750, see Hartwell, Caus
the Industrial Revolution, pp. 22-3. On growth before 1750, see my forthcoming
article.
ments which have been made of the growth variables show no sud-
den leap in the eighteenth century which could explain the industrial
revolution.35 Therefore, the theory of a revolution, quickly generated
and without previous growth, can be dismissed.
The second explanation is also revolutionary, but it pushes the
initial and crucial turning point back by about a century and
argues that the industrial revolution was preceded by a previous
economic expansion which finally built up to a mutually reinforcing
faster growth process. This means that there must have been two
turning points; and although there is no certainty about the date of
the first turning point-1760, 1740, 1690, and 1660 have been sug-
gested-there is wide support for the thesis that the beginning of
growth is earlier than the 1780 so clearly demarcated, with measur-
able criteria, by Ashton.36 Wilson, for example, has argued cogently
that, "The Restoration has a better claim than most dates to be re-
garded as the economic exit from medievalism."37 Habakkuk and
Deane, on the other hand, have argued, "the sustained rise in the
rate of growth of output probably dates back to the 1740's."38 Those
who argue for such a dating of the industrial revolution seem to
suggest a two-tiered take-off, one launching the economy, the other
blasting it into self-sustained growth. The problems of explanation,
therefore, become more intricate. What caused the initial take-off?
What caused the subsequent blast-off? No historian has yet pre-
sented a realistic analysis of such a two-stage growth process; nor
has any historian given an explicit account of the nature of the pre-
industrial economy under such a process. But perhaps a model of
growth in these circumstances is not difficult to devise, given the
initial, first-stage growth. The second stage the industrial revolu-
tion-occurred because the real incomes of the majority of English-
men passed a threshold of subsistence about the middle of the
eighteenth century; income beyond subsistence created sufficient
new demands and savings to provide the necessary stimulus for, and
the necessary investment in, new and old industries; it also allowed
35 See Deane and Cole, British Economic Growth, for estimates of rates of growth
of population and capital formation, and for other growth indexes.
36 T. S. Ashton, An Economic History of England: The 18th Century (London:
Methuen, 1955), p. 125.
37 C. Wilson, England's Apprenticeship, 1603-1763 (London: Longmans, 1965),
p. 236.
88 H. J. Habakkuk and P. Deane, "The Take-off in Britain," The Economics of
Take-off into Sustained Growth, ed. W. W. Rostow (London: Macmillan, 1963),
p. 82.
more people to survive and population to increase; the faster-increas-
ing and richer population enabled the increasing use of larger plant,
enabled the economy to take increasing advantage of returns to
scale, as the size of population shifted nearer to its optimum.89 All
this may be true, but the major problems still remain unexplained.
When and why did the initial growth occur? How did this growth
relate to previous growths (for example, in the sixteenth century)?
The third type of explanation is both evolutionary and revolution-
ary; it recognizes the reality of the industrial revolution as the great
discontinuity, but it argues that there was growth before the in-
dustrial revolution, and that the final speeding-up "did but carry
further, though on a far greater scale and with far greater rapidity,
change which had been proceeding long before."40 This explanation
of the industrial revolution, which I accept, sees industrialization
as a significant change in the rate of growth, first of industrial out-
put, and later, of total output. This explanation recognizes also that
economic growth was a European phenomenon, the achievement of
a very long and complicated process of change.41 There had been
economic growth in Europe since at least the eleventh century,
growth that was very slow compared with that of the industrial
revolution, growth that had its setbacks and cycles, but growth
which produced in England by the eighteenth century a relatively
advanced economy. This is very long-term growth, as distinct from
long-term growth, and neither economist nor historian can explain
it convincingly. Economic theory is good at explaining small change
over short periods;42 its time horizon does not extend to seven cen-
turies-the length of the period between the Norman Conquest and
89 Eric Jones has suggested to me that whereas subsistence needs (food, shelter,
and clothing) had been satisfied by small-scale industries in which technical change
was slow and in which the economies of scale were relatively unimportant, the more
sophisticated and complex demands of the second half of the eighteenth century
could be satisfied only by the development of new techniques, and, in some cases, by
a larger scale of industrial unit.
40 Ashley, Economic Organization, p. 141.
41 This point has not been stressed enough by economic historians. See, however,
H. J. Habakkuk's comment, "The Historical Experience of the Basic Conditions of
Economic Progress," Economic Progress, ed. L. H. Dupriez (Louvain: Institut de
Recherches Economiques et Sociales, 1955), p. 150, "It is probable that the most
important of the conditions which made Europe the cradle of economic advance
originated very far back in her history."
42 For example, the admission of R. G. Lipsey, An Introduction to Positive Eco-
nomics (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1963), p. 175, about the theory of pro-
duction: "There is no theory of long-run costs in the sense of a body of hypotheses
that predict something about the world and are, therefore, at least in principle,
refutable.'
the industrial revolution-even if the statistical record of this long
period were better documented. Historical theory, what there is of
it, is even less helpful; those historians who have attempted very
long-term analysis-like Toynbee-have produced nonoperational
systems which command little confidence, or operational systems o
such generality as to be virtually useless. Only the classical eco-
nomists-in particular, Malthus and Marx-have provided the his-
torian with widely used theories of growth;43 and only the German
historical school of economists-and more recently, Rostow-has
provided a very long-term analysis of the development of economic
systems.44 There is no theory of economic history, and so the eco-
nomic historian has depended, too uncritically, on the Marxist
theory of capitalist development and on the historical school theory
of the stages of growth, in spite of the fact that both of these
theories should enter into the serious discussion of very long-
term growth only as historical curios or as examples of contemporary
ideological pathology. But even without adequate theory, the
researches of economic historians should be able to tell us somethin
about the character of this very long-term pre-industrial growth.
III
Even a relatively short-term analysis by historians of the English

economy before 1750 reveals much change, and some, if immeasura-
48 For Marx, history consisted of a series of stages in an inevitable evolution of

society and economy toward socialism; each stage had its characteristic technology,
and its uniquely induced class struggle which led to the breakdown of the system and
to the emergence of a new and higher form of social and economic organization.
Technological change was the prime mover; the class struggle was the means of
"progress." For Malthus, population pressure was the prime mover of history, and
although he had his own version of the classical theory of development, it is the
long-term relationship between population and resources, as he envisaged it, which
has had a profound influence on historical thinking. See, for example, B. H. Slicher
van Bath, The Agrarian History of Western Europe, A.D. 500-1850 (London: Ed-
ward Arnold, 1963), p. 89, for a discussion of European economic growth, 1150-
1300, where he argues that agricultural expansion had not kept pace with population:
"The result was relative overpopulation."
44 On the theory of stages, see B. F. Hoselitz, 'Theories of Stages of Economic
Growth," Theories of Economic Growth, by B. F. Hoselitz et al. (Glencoe, Ill.: The
Free Press, 1960) for a detailed and critical summary of the German school-List,
Hildebrand, Bucher, Schmoller and Sombart-and for a short account of other ex-
ponents-See, Hauser, Heckscher, Block, and Spiethoff. See, also, N. S. B. Gras,
"Stages in Economic History," Journal of Economic and Business History, II (1930),
for a summary of the usefulness of economic stages for historians. For a critique of
Rostow, see: A. K. Cairncross, "The Stages of Economic Growth," ch. 8 of Factors
in Economic Development; and E. E. Hagen, On the Theory of Social Change: How
Economic Growth Begins (Homewood, IM.; The Dorsey Press, 1962), appendix.
ble, growth. Wilson argues of the previous ce

ing vitality of industry was widely visible."45 Westerfield showed,
long ago, that in the century before 1760 "there developed a trading
and mercantile class, a new kind of man . .. who took the initiative
in new methods of organization ... who influenced the policies of
state to the furtherance of commerce . . . who undertook activities
new to the economic life then existent."40 Kerridge begins a recent
book provocatively: "This book argues that the agricultural revolu-
tion took place in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth cen-
turies and not in the eighteenth century";47 and Jones agrees, "There
is some support, both contemporary and modern, for locating a
distinct acceleration in the rate of advance in farming in the very
middle of the seventeenth century."48 Davis asserts that so great was
the transformation of foreign trade Ccwe may well attach to the
period running from the English Restoration to American Indepen-
dence the title of 'The Commercial Revolution.' "49 Even "the trans-
port revolution," conventionally dated from the Sankey Brook
Navigation of the 1750's, was preceded by considerable advance:
over 1000 miles of navigable river and 55 turnpike acts by 1750.50
Dickson, in a massively documented volume, has established that a
"financial revolution" took place in England between 1688 and 1756,
laying the modern bases of both public and private credit.5' In sci
ence, Singer has shown that whereas the seventeenth century was
an "insurgent century," involving a fundamental change in the
conception of the structure of the universe, the eighteenth centur
turned successfully to an understanding and analysis of the mechan
cal world which had progressed far by midcentury.52 In technolog
in that most important innovation-steam power-Harris has cal-
culated that about 60 Newcomen engines were constructed betwe
45 C. Wilson, England's Apprenticeship, p. 288.
46 R. B. Westerfield, Middlemen in English Business, Particularly Between 1660
and 1760 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1915), p. 214.
47 E. Kerridge, The Agricultural Revolution (London: Allen and Unwin, 1967),
p. 15.
48 E. Jones, in a review of The Agrarian History of England and Wales, Vol. IV
(Cambridge University Press, 1967) Economic History Review, 2d. ser.; XXI (1968).
49 R. Davis, A Commercial Revolution (Historical Association Pamphlet, no. 64,
London, 1967), p. 3.
50 For a summary of transport developments see B. F. Duckham, The Transpo
Revolution, 1750-1830 (Historical Association Aids for Teachers Series, no. 14, 19
51 P. G. M. Dickson, The Financial Revolution in England: A Study in the Dev
opment of Public Credit in England, 1688-1756 (London: Macmillan, 1967).
52 C. Singer, A Short History of Scientific Ideas to 1900 (Oxford, [Eng.]: T
University Press, 1959), chs. VII and VIII.
1710 and 1733, and 300 between 1734 and 1781, demonstrating the
widespread use of steam power before the industrial revolution
diffusion of Watt engines.53 As against this evidence of growth,
however, the one large-scale attempt to quantify preindustrial
growth-by Deane and Cole-argues that "in the early part of the
eighteenth century there are few signs of growth in the economy
as a whole," and that "before 1745 . . . total output grew very
slowly."54 Wilson, after showing that the forty years 1660 to 1700
were "one of the most fertile and progressive periods in English
history down to this time," argues also, "almost all sectors-agricul-
ture, trade (home and foreign), industry, population growth-show
a weak momentum from the twenties to the fifties, when the forward
movement was strongly resumed."55 Slicher van Bath has described
the whole century 1650 to 1750 as one of agricultural depression:
"Both 1300-1450 and 1650-1750 were periods in which an agricultural
depression reigned all over western Europe ... yet the fall in prices
was not necessarily accomplished by a general decline in produc-
tion."56 But English agricultural historians-for example, Mingay,
John, and Kerridge-argue that the first half of the eighteenth
century was the period of "the agricultural depression"; as Kerridge
writes, "To all appearances the first half of the eighteenth century
was a period of depression and stagnation, broken by short outbursts
of restricted progress in the spread of what were by now almost
completed innovations."57 The composite picture is confusing, but
insofar as there is an accepted view of the century 1660 to 1760, it
is that promising growth after the Restoration slowed down early
in the eighteenth century to be resumed again some time after
1750. But the evidence is such that we cannot be certain of these
trends.
Historians' interpretations of the century 1540-1640 strikingly
53 J. R. Harris, "The Employment of Steam Power in the Eighteenth Century,"

History, LII, 175 (1967), p. 147.
54 Deane and Cole, British Economic Growth, pp. 79-80.
55 Wilson, England's Apprenticeship, pp. xii, 276.
56 Slicher van Bath, Agrarian History, p. 207.
57 G. F. Mingay, "The Agricultural Depression, 1730-1750," Economic History
Review, 2d ser., VIII, 3 (1956); A. H. John, "The Course of Agricultural Change,
1660-1760," Studies in the Industrial Revolution, ed. L. S. Pressnell (London: Ath-
lone, 1960); Kerridge, Agricultural Revolution, p. 334. John's interpretation is much
qualified, and even more in a subsequent article, "Aspects of English Economic
Growth in the First Half of the Eighteenth Century" (Economica, XXVIII, 1961),
by seeing in the first half of the eighteenth century the beginnings of the industrial
revolution.
parallel those of the century 1660-1760. In 1934 Nef questioned

whether the late eighteenth century was the first period in English
history in which a remarkable speeding up of industrial develop-
ment had occurred. "The opinion is gaining strength," he wrote,
"that there was at least one earlier period during which the rate of
change was scarcely less striking. This period begins at about the
time of the dissolution of the monasteries, and the industrial develop-
ment becomes most rapid during the latter half of Elizabeth's reign
and the reign of James I. The forces of rapid change then set in
motion continue throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth cen-
turies."58 This thesis he documented from a series of well-known
studies of particular industries, on cotton, coal, iron and steel,
woolens and worsteds, lead and tin mining, cutlery, etc. Later re-
search, though sometimes critical, has also given confirmation to
Nef's thesis; for example, the recent large-scale study of industry
before the industrial revolution by Rees shows that, whereas En-
gland at the beginning of the sixteenth century was relatively poor
and backward in industrial skills and resources, there was rapid
advance during the century, and especially after mid-century. A
remarkable expansion of the coal industry was paralleled by equally
revolutionary development in the mining and smelting of metals.59
Similarly in glassmaking, Kenyon has written recently that the in-
dustry had been unimpressive in its growth before 1560, but de-
veloped spectacularly thereafter." For agriculture, fortunately, we
now have The Agrarian History of England and Wales, which docu-
ments agricultural change for this period, showing how rising prices
and profit inflation in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth
centuries induced an arable expansion, but without, apparently, any
agricultural improvement. Kerridge, however, argues that the period
1560 to 1612 was the period of "the agricultural revolution.""' In
foreign trade the reign of Elizabeth was also a period of progress:
in 1550, according to Rabb, England was "a commercial backwater
of Europe . . . But by 1630 the foundations of her later economic
58 J. U. Nef, "The Progress of Technology and the Growth of Large Scale Industry
in Great Britain, 1540-1640," Economic History Review, V (1934), p. 4. The indus-
trial histories used in this article are detailed in fn. 3, pp. 3-4.
59 W. Rees, Industry before the Industrial Revolution (2 vols.; Cardiff: University
of Wales Press, 1968).
60 G. H. Kenyon, The Glass Industry of the Weald (Leicester: The University
Press, 1967).
61 The Agrarian History of England and Wales, especially ch. 10 by P. Bowden;
Kerridge, Agricultural Revolution, p. 347.
strength had been laid." "The changes . . . that took place between
the last years of Edward VI's reign and the first years of Charles I's
reign amounted to one of the most striking transformations in eco-
nomic history."62 However, as occurred also a century later, this
many-sided growth gave way to depression, and possibly decline.
The period between 1603 and 1660 has been described by Wilson as
"the lean years";63 Bowden writes of "economic collapse" after 1620
and that, "Bad harvests, plague outbreaks, poverty, and unemploy-
ment were among the dominant characteristics of this and two
subsequent decades";64 Supple, in the most detailed study of this
period, argues that 1620 saw "perhaps the most acute breakdown of
the English economy of the first half of the seventeenth century" in
that after some recovery in mid-decade the period after 1625 was
one of "a debilitated commerce," and that the thirties was a decade
of "long-term contraction."65 But again, the evidence is ambiguous:
coal production, according to Nef, increased fourteen-fold between
1600 and 1660;66 industries were "increasing substantially" and
"people were flowing into towns and cities at a faster rate," accord-
ing to Wilson;67 the period 1621 to 1656, according to Kerridge,
was one of "further advances" in agriculture, with widespread im-
provements and innovations.68
The time schedule now extends, and the boundaries become in-
distinct, but the story is the same: growth and doubtful depression
and decline. On a European scale the conventional story is that
economic advance began in the eleventh century, economic de-
cline in the fourteenth, and economic recovery in the late fifteenth
or early sixteenth century. It is generally agreed, also for Europe,
that whatever economic growth there had been in the ancient
world, the barbarian invasions marked a retrogression which lasted
several centuries, indeed until the second millennium. But even
this view is now challenged: Latouche argues that the Dark Ages
62 T. K. Rabb, Enterprise and Empire: Merchant and Gentry Investment in the

Expansion of England, 1575-1630 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967),
pp. 2, 97.
63 Wilson, England's Apprenticeship, p. v.
64 The Agrarian History of England and Wales (Bowden), pp. 640-1.
65 B. E. Supple, Commercial Crisis and Change in England, 1600-1642 (Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959), pp. 52, 119-20.
66 J. U. Nef, The Rise of the British Coal Industry (London: Routledge, 1932),
Vol. I, p. 19.
67 Wilson, England's Apprenticeship, p. 81.
68 Kerridge, Agricultural Revolution, p. 348.
marked "a profound and irrevocable transformation" of the Eu-
ropean economy during which it was "desouthernized";69 Metcalf
has claimed that northwestern Europe (including England) was
"by the end of the eighth century a wealthy area";70 and Bridb
argues, for England, that "between the Settlements and Domes-
day, England was transformed by a social revolution," and an
agricultural revolution in which "forest and moor were subdued;
the heavier soils, an intractable problem to the Romans, grew
corn."'7' However, whatever economic change preceded Domesday,
there appears to have been faster growth from the eleventh century.
In the twelfth century, according to Slicher van Bath, "a period of
exuberant development broke out in western and southern Europe.
In the cultural as well as the material field a high point was reached
in the years between 1150 and 1300 that was not equaled again till
much later."72 Postan has argued, for England, that this growth
lasted from some time in the twelfth to the beginning of the four-
teenth century, after which there was a period of depression and
decline until toward the end of the fifteenth century.73 Carus-Wilson
has described developments in the woolen industry in the thirteenth
century as constituting "an industrial revolution."74 Agricultural
growth at the same time took the form of the extension of cultiva-
tion, the rise of cottar farms, and the use of marling to supplement
animal manuring.75 English population, it has been estimated,
reached a peak in the mid-fourteenth century, and was not again
greater until the late sixteenth century; it was at a low in 1400, but
thereafter increased, especially from the mid-fifteenth century.76
Economic decline manifested itself, not only in a falling population
but also in decaying trade and industry, and in deep agricultural
depression. In agriculture there was a transfer from cereals to sheep
69 Latouche, Birth of Western Economy, p. 309.

70 D. M. Metcalf, "The Prosperity of North-Western Europe in the Eighth and
Ninth Centuries," Economic History Review, 2d ser.; XX (1967), p. 356.
71 From an unpublished manuscript by A. R. Bridbury, with the permission of the
author.
72 Slicher van Bath, Agrarian History, p. 132.
73 M. M. Postan, "The Fifteenth Century," Economic History Review, IX (1939);
"Some Economic Evidence of Declining Population in the later Middle Ages," ibid.,
2d ser.; II (1950).
74 Carus-Wilson, "Industrial Revolution."
75 Slicher van Bath, Agrarian History, pp. 134, 136.
76 K. F. Helleiner, "The Population of Europe from the Black Death to the Eve
of the Vital Revolution," The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol. IV
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967), pp. 13, 31.
from arable to pasture; this was the period of the "lost village," so
well documented by Beresford.77 This depression has inspired con-
siderable research and controversy; those who accept its reality
agree, generally, that it was not caused by the Black Death (the
decline had already set in before the plague devastated Europe),
but either by a Malthusian situation (a combination of population
growth and the colonization of marginal land), or by an overexpan-
sion of agriculture beyond the needs of existing population (so that
cereal prices fell, and arable farming contracted). The reality of the
depression, however, has not gone unchallenged. Cipolla has ques-
tioned it for Europe, and for England Carus-Wilson has argued for
an expansion of the woolen industry in the fourteenth century and
has produced evidence of industrial growth on some fifteenth-cen-
tury manors.78 Bridbury has devoted a book, entitled Economic
Growth, to prove that the growth which led ultimately to the indus-
trial revolution in England began in the later middle ages; he points
out, for example, that historians have ignored the rise in living
standards which occurred during "the depression," and draws a
parallel with the growth of the late seventeenth century.79 He cou
also have made a comparison with "the great depression" after 1873
when the clamor of the more privileged about reduced profit margins
concealed the rising real wages of the working classes.80 So, once
again, the historians leave us with doubts about what really hap-
pened.
IV
What does this puzzling compendium of historians' accounts of

preindustrial growth amount to? How does it help answer the que
tions posed at the beginning of this paper? It should be emphasize
in the first place, that no historian has yet attempted to calcula
or depict the very long-term aggregate trend of the English econ
omy; although some long-term series exist (for prices, yields, and
77 M. Beresford, The Lost Villages of England (London: Butterworth, 1954).

78 C. M. Cipolla, "Economic Depression of the Renaissance?," Economic Histor
Review, 2d ser.; XVI (1964); E. M. Carus-Wilson, "Trends in the Export of Engli
Woollens in the Fourteenth Century," Economic History Review, 2d ser.; III (195
and "Evidences of Industrial Growth on some Fifteenth-Century Manors," ibi
2d ser.; XII (1959).
79 A. R. Bridbury, Economic Growth: England in the Later Middle Ages (L
Allen and Unwin, 1962).
80 H. L. Beales, "'The Great Depression' in Industry and Trade," Economic His-
tory Review, V (1934).
wages, for example),81 we do not know, in any useful way, what
growth there was in the English economy, say between Domesday
and 1750. Moreover, the work of the historians on particular periods,
problems, and factors cannot be added up to make a convincing
composite picture; their aims, concepts, and criteria are sufficiently
different to make aggregation difficult or impossible. However, the
consensus view would appear to be that the English economy had
three quite definite periods of growth before the industrial revolu-
tion, each of which lapsed, less surely, into depression or decline.
But such is the character of the historians' efforts that we cannot
say with confidence whether preindustrial economic change con-
sisted of very slow, very long-term secular growth, with long cycles;
or of very long-term secular stagnation, with false starts which were
always reversed; or of long-term secular stagnation followed, say
in the sixteenth century, by long-term growth, both with cycles.
Much of the difficulty of interpretation arises from the fact that
different historians have used different criteria to demonstrate
growth, and have tended also to generalize from sectoral experience.
It is obvious that before there is more research and controversy
there should be an agreed specification of the problem to be in-
vestigated, and an agreed nomenclature of terms and concepts. His-
torians must agree about what they mean by preindustrial growth,
either accepting an economist's definition of growth, or devising a
definition to suit the needs and evidence (especially statistical) of
this period; they must face seriously the problem of aggregation, of
determining when sectoral growth or growths can be identified with,
or added up to, a general trend for the whole economy; they must
decide when, indeed, there was an English economy rather than a
collection of self-contained or trading regions within England. On
nomenclature there should be agreement also about terms other
than growth which are commonly used; for example, revolution,
depression, decline, crisis, and capitalism. Is it meaningful, or at all
helpful, for example, to talk about the scientific revolution (stretch-
ing over several centuries), the financial revolution, the price revo-
lution, two commercial revolutions, at least two agricultural
revolutions, and at least three industrial revolutions? When does
depression mean absolute decline and when does it mean the down-
81 W. Beveridge and others, Prices and Wages in England (London: Longmans,
Green and Co., 1939); B. H. Slicher van Bath, Yield Ratios, 810-1820 (A. A. G.
Bijdragen, 10; Wagenigen, 1963); E. H. Phelps Brown and S. V. Hopkins, "Seven
Centuries of Building Wages," Economica, XXII (1955).
phase of a cycle superimposed on a growth trend? A main source of
confusion is the tendency of each historian to elevate his period, his
growth factor, his depression or crisis, to a status of prime impor-
tance, either in the history of capitalism or of industrialization, and
thus by definition to make it revolutionary. Only a very long-term
view can mitigate this particular type of parochialism.
My argument is that we should define problems in such a way
that we know what an historian is investigating and can compare
the work of different historians. We should also define criteria in
such a way that conclusions can be tested and conflicting conclu-
sions reconciled. We need a very long-term picture of the English
economy against which to test particular and short-term studies.
Then historical discussion will be meaningful and not confused by
misunderstanding, by terminological confusion, and by comparing
incomparables. With agreement about what is meant by preindus-
trial growth, and how it can be measured and/or described, it might
be possible to determine and explain the very long-term growth
trend of the preindustrial economy of England, and to reconcile the
confused and confusing conclusions of the historians who have
written so copiously and so vigorously about economic change over
shorter periods. If, at the same time, there is agreement about what
is meant by capitalism, it might be possible, also, to determine the
role of "the rise of capitalism" both in the preindustrial very long-
term growth of England and in the industrial revolution and the
sustained economic growth that followed.
RICHARD M. HARTWELL, Nuffield College, Oxford

Cambridge University Press, Economic History Association The Journal of Economic History

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Economic History Association

T HIS paper, as presented at the Fourth Congress of the Interna-

1 The other papers are entitled: "Economic Growth in England, 1550-1750";

These are large and largely unanswered questions. To an important

5 W. J. Ashley, The Economic Organization of England (London: Longmans,

10 See, however, M. Dobb, Studies in the Development of Capitalism (London:

accepting a simple capital-induced growth model of the rise of

Place of Capital in Economic Progress," Factors in Economic Development (London:

Commerce in Modern Times: Laissez Faire (Cambridge, [Eng.]: The University

deed, that when the historians turned specifically to explain indus-

24 See R. M. Hartwell, "The Causes of the Industrial Revolution: An Essay in

the long-term economic growth curve to deny the very existence of

I have argued elsewhere that although the industrial revolution

27 For example, N. S. B. Gras entitled his history of industry, Industrial Evolution

in manufacturing industry and services reached modern proportions;

31 See P. Deane and W. A. Cole, British Economic Growth, 1688-1959 (Cam-

Even a relatively short-term analysis by historians of the English

48 For Marx, history consisted of a series of stages in an inevitable evolution of

ble, growth. Wilson argues of the previous ce

53 J. R. Harris, "The Employment of Steam Power in the Eighteenth Century,"

parallel those of the century 1660-1760. In 1934 Nef questioned

62 T. K. Rabb, Enterprise and Empire: Merchant and Gentry Investment in the

69 Latouche, Birth of Western Economy, p. 309.

What does this puzzling compendium of historians' accounts of

77 M. Beresford, The Lost Villages of England (London: Butterworth, 1954).

RICHARD M. HARTWELL, Nuffield College, Oxford

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