Wrecking, the illegal seizure of materials and cargo of shipwrecks, was an important economic activity for centuries. Kersti Lust, in the latest issue of IRSH (62, 2017), studied hundred of shipwrecks between 1780 and 1870 in what is today Estonia. The international scholarly tradition views wrecking as an activity of the common people. Lust argues that manorial lords, who were responsible for enforcing the law at the local level, benefited at a large scale from wrecking too. In wrecking, collaboration between peasants and their lords proceeded without much conflict in this period.
Other research articles in this new IRSH issue include:
- Ad Knotter, Precarious Labour and Trade Union Response in the Dutch Cleaning Industry (1988-2012)
- Julia Laite: Women's Labour, Migration and Sex Trafficking in the Early Twentieth Century
In the Suggestions and Debate Section, Elise van Nederveen Meerkerk, Karin Hofmeester and Christine Moll-Murata discuss Big Questions and Big Data: the role of labour and labour relations in recent global labour history.
East coast of Osmussaar, Estonia (photo Tonis Saadre on wikipedia)
The International Review of Social History is published for the IISH by Cambridge University Press