The history of the forms of “free” labour is intimately linked to that of coerced labour. In this book, worldwide acknowledged specialists of Russia, China, Russia, Japan, India, the Indian Ocean, France and Britain show that between the seventeenth and the twentieth century, forms of labour and bondage were defined and practised in reference to each other. Labour relationships found their sources not only in the global circulation of models, peoples, goods and institutions, but also in market dynamics. Proto-industry, agriculture, trade and manufacturing experienced unprecedented growth throughout Eurasia. Mostly labour-intensive, this long-term growth put considerable pressure on labour resources and contributed to increased coercion and legal constraints on labour mobility in both Asia and Europe.
Table of contents
Notes on Contributors
Introduction: Labour, Coercion, and Economic Growth in Eurasia, Seventeenth to Early Twentieth centuries, Alessandro Stanziani
PART ONE: JURIDICAL MODELS AND LABOUR DYNAMICS
The Duty to Work: A Comparison of the Common Law and Civil Law Systems from the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Centuries, Simon Deakin
Dutch Imperial Anxieties About Free Labour, Penal Sanctions and the Right to Strike, Ulbe Bosma
Children and Forced Labour in the Indian Ocean World, Circa 1750-1900, Gwyn Campbell
PART TWO: DEPENDANCE AND SERVITUDE AT WORK. LOCAL CUSTOMS AND GLOBAL DYNAMICS
Factors that Shaped the Organization of Labor and the Labor Market in Tokugawa Japan: Kyoto and Central Japan, Mary Louise Nagata
Contractual Relations, Tariffs and Customs in the Lyon Silk Industry in the Nineteenth Century, Pierre Vernus
The Circulation of Commercial Manpower in an Indian Worldwide Trading Network in the Early Twentieth Century, Claude Markovits
PART THREE: DANGEROUS TIES: STATE, LANDLORDS AND LONGUE DURÉE SERVITUDES
Constrained Labour in Early-Modern Rural East-Central and Eastern Europe: Regional Variation and its Causes, Markus Cerman
Rights and Bondage in Russian Serfdom, Alessandro Stanziani
Acting as Master and Bondservant Considerations on Status Identities and the Nature of “Bond-servitude” in Late Ming China, Claude Chevaleyre
Public Works and the Question of Unfree Labour, Chitra Joshi
References
Index