Home Feed
Home
Search
Search
Add Review, Blurb, Quote
Add
Activity
Activity
Profile
Profile
Empire of Cotton
Empire of Cotton: A Global History | Sven Beckert
The epic story of the rise and fall of the empire of cotton, its centrality to the world economy, and its making and remaking of global capitalism.?? Cotton is so ubiquitous as to be almost invisible, yet understanding its history is key to understanding the origins of modern capitalism. Sven Beckerts rich, fascinating book tells the story of how, in a remarkably brief period, European entrepreneurs and powerful statesmen recast the worlds most significant manufacturing industry, combining imperial expansion and slave labor with new machines and wage workers to change the world. Here is the story of how, beginning well before the advent of machine production in the 1780s, these men captured ancient trades and skills in Asia, and combined them with the expropriation of lands in the Americas and the enslavement of African workers to crucially reshape the disparate realms of cotton that had existed for millennia, and how industrial capitalism gave birth to an empire, and how this force transformed the world.?? The empire of cotton was, from the beginning, a fulcrum of constant global struggle between slaves and planters, merchants and statesmen, workers and factory owners. Beckert makes clear how these forces ushered in the world of modern capitalism, including the vast wealth and disturbing inequalities that are with us today. The result is a book as unsettling as it is enlightening: a book that brilliantly weaves together the story of cotton with how the present global world came to exist.
Amazon Indiebound Barnes and Noble WorldCat Goodreads LibraryThing
review
Cosmos_Moon_River
post image
Bailedbailed

Interesting at first, but a bit monotonous and don‘t have the patience for 20+ hours of audiobook. I thought it would be interesting from the Port industry perspective. Thought the narrative about war capitalism was intriguing. Maybe I‘d finish in the future.

blurb
Cosmos_Moon_River
post image

Onto the next audiobook in the lineup... 600+ “pages” of cotton history. Hopefully interesting! Starting out good discussing a history of war capitalism, land expropriation and slavery.

blurb
melissanorr
post image

I'm trying with this book but then he says things like "a fairly small amount of capital...the equivalent of about half a million US dollars" and I get really frustrated.

blurb
melissanorr
post image

Starting a new work week with a new book.

blurb
AEBowenPhD
post image

Summer reading that's dissertation-adjacent begins...

3 likes1 stack add