The Consumer Revolution, 1650–1800

Michael Kwass (The Johns Hopkins University, Maryland)

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English

Cambridge University Press
03 February 2022

European history; Consumerism

Series: New Approaches to European History

The production, acquisition, and use of consumer goods defines our daily lives, and yet consumerism is seen as increasingly controversial. Movements for sustainable and ethical consumerism are gaining momentum alongside an awareness of how our choices in the marketplace can affect public issues. How did we get here? This volume advances a bold new interpretation of the 'consumer revolution' of the eighteenth century, when European elites, middling classes, and even certain labourers purchased unprecedented quantities of clothing, household goods, and colonial products. Michael Kwass adopts a global perspective that incorporates the expansion of European empires, the development of world trade, and the rise of plantation slavery in the Americas. Kwass analyses the emergence of Enlightenment material cultures, contentious philosophical debates on the morality of consumption, and new forms of consumer activism to offer a fresh interpretation of the politics of consumption in the age of abolitionism and the Atlantic Revolutions.

By: Michael Kwass (The Johns Hopkins University Maryland)
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Edition: New edition
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 157mm, Spine: 19mm
Weight: 510g
ISBN: 9780521198707
ISBN 10: 0521198704
Series: New Approaches to European History
Pages: 272
Publication Date: 03 February 2022
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Michael Kwass is a Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University. He is author of Privilege and the Politics of Taxation in Eighteenth-Century France: Liberté, Égalité, Fiscalité (Cambridge, 2000), which received the David H. Pinkney Prize; and Contraband: Louis Mandrin and the Making of a Global Underground (2014), which was awarded the J. Russell Major Prize, the Gilbert Chinard Prize, the Annibel Jenkins Prize, and the Oscar Kenshur Prize.

Reviews for The Consumer Revolution, 1650–1800

'The Consumer Revolution, 1650-1800 is a well-written and well-conceived book that presents an up-to-date account of scholarship on the Consumer Revolution alongside an expert's critical account of that scholarship and where it needs to go in the future. Students and scholars will surely appreciate the overview of the field provided and the suggestions for more specialized reading.' Clare Crowston, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 'For many years now, Michael Kwass has been one of the most innovative contributors to debates on consumer culture in early modern France. Now, his The Consumer Revolution provides a superbly comprehensive and intelligently nuanced account of the global impact of western consumerism before the industrial age, that remains nicely alert to comparisons with our own society.' Colin Jones, author of The Great Nation: France 1715-99 'Kwass's The Consumer Revolution brilliantly charts the remarkable economic, cultural, and political consequences of new consumer practices in this era of skyrocketing global trade, from the rise of calicoes, sugar, or tobacco to the shifting politics of fashion in the age of revolutions. Comprehensive, imaginative, and a pleasure to read.' William Sewell, University of Chicago