Global History of Capitalism

While capitalism is undoubtedly a global phenomenon, for the most part its history has been written in national segments (American, British, Japanese capitalism). In this seminar, we seek to explore the global turn in the recent literature on the history of capitalism. The aim is less to arrive at a comprehensive narrative, but rather to assess different ways of situating, and explaining, capitalism in a global context. Questions we will discuss include: What was/is capitalism? Where did it originate, and when? Is capitalism an economic mode, or a more general concept? Can we speak of different and separate genealogies of capitalism in different locations? Was capitalism spread by imperialism, or was imperialism the effect of a stage of capitalism? What was capitalism’s relationship with slavery? Has capitalism alleviated or exacerbated inequality, within and across societies? How can we understand the neoliberal turn in the longer history of capitalism? In what ways has capitalism changed over the course of the past few centuries?