Pepijn Brandon (IISH and Vrije Universiteit) has been awarded a Veni-grant (NWO) for his project Naval shipyards: Laboratories of capitalism. His research will focus on the impact of war industry, state intervention and forced labour on industrial development.
In his project, Brandon will make a comparison between the naval shipyards of Amsterdam, Plymouth (UK), Havana (Spanish Cuba) and Norfolk (Virginia). During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, each of these shipyards in its own way played a prominent role in the introduction of industrial methods of production. These large state-enterprises often were technological front-runners. In many cases they employed not only wage laborers but also forced laborers and slaves. This shines new light on the history of industrial capitalism.
About Pepijn Brandon
Brandon is a researcher at the IISH and the Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam. He studied social and economic history at the University of Amsterdam, where he obtained his PhD (cum laude) in 2013 for his dissertation Masters of War. State, Capital, and Military Enterprise in the Dutch Cycle of Acccumulation (1600-1795). His dissertation was awarded the D.J. Veegens Prize in 2014, and was published by Brill last year under the title War, Capital, and the Dutch State (1588-1795).
Veni Grant
The NWO’s Veni grants allow first-class researchers who have recently obtained their PhD an opportunity to develop their ideas further for a period of three years.