Taming Capitalism Before Its Triumph

Paperback, 360 pages

English language

Published May 26, 2021 by Oxford University Press.

ISBN:: 978-0-19-284833-8

(1 review)

This study examines the darker side of England's culture of economic improvement between 1640 and 1720. It is often suggested that England in this period grew strikingly confident of its prospect for unlimited growth. Indeed, merchants, inventors, and others promised to achieve immense profit and abundance. Such flowery promises were then, as now, prone to perversion, however. This volume is concerned with the taming of incipient capitalism — how a society in the past responded when promises of wealth creation went badly wrong. It reveals a history of numerous visible hands taming incipient capitalism, a story that Adam Smith and his admirers have long set aside.

2 editions

Justin Pickard reviewed Taming Capitalism Before Its Triumph by Koji Yamamoto

Solid history of the early modern 'projector'

4 stars

Robust historical study of the entrepreneurial 'projector' in early modern England, and the part this widely stigmatised figure played in taming the excesses of incipient, early modern capitalism. As a book-length academic history text, the depth of evidence and level of detail was greater than my requirements, but it's well-written, with the early and concluding chapters did a good job of sketching a particular historical trajectory. I particularly appreciated the work Yamamoto does in connecting his arguments to contemporary debates about corporate social responsibility, innovation, and extractivist or rentier capitalism.