The Rise and Fall of the Scottish Cotton Industry, 1778-1914: 'The Secret Spring'

Description

This is the first full-length history of the Scottish cotton industry, from its beginnings in the late eighteenth century to its premature decline in the years leading up to the First World War. The book examines the industry chronologically and through themes such as precursors, technology, capital and employers, markets, labour and work, placed within their broader economic and scoial contexts. Its account of the cotton industry is set within important historiographical debates such as proto-industrialisation, the speed of industrial change, the diffusion of technology, the labour process, paternalism, workplace control, entrepreneurship and theories of industrial decline. Cotton was Scotland's premier industry during the Industrial Revolution and this book will be wlecomed by specialists, students and interested readers alike. -- .

Anthony Cooke was formerly Senior Lecturer in Continuing Education, University of Dundee and Historical Consultant to Historic Scotland on the restoration of Stanley Mills, Perthshire -- .

this is very good social and economic history (The rise and fall of the Scottish cotton industry) has clearly elaborated the multi-dimensional character of the Scottish textile industry Tony Cooke has made a notable contribution to our understanding of early industrialisation and its impact...This is a significant study very well written...an excellent study of the cotton industry in Scotland a book of quality that acts as a welcome addition to historical analyses of this important area of Scottish manufacturing...helps to deliver new and interesting information on the historiography of the cotton industry A very well-written account of a Scottish industry...(photographs and colour plates, for example of the sari shawl peacock design) add yet more to this very accessible study This is a well-written and informative general history of Scottish cotton manufacturing from its emergence out of the linen industry down to its shrinking almost to insignificance by the First World War....the book is rich in technological and social detail. It is rightly concerned with the social and political context within which the industry operates, without succumbing too much to a 'culturalist' reading of the industry's demise "... Cooke has explored a range of personal manuscript papers, correspondence, Chamber of Commerce records, wills, fire insurance and Court of Session records, to piece together a convincing history." "... much ground is covered." "Cooke is adept at demonstrating the operation of myriad forms of production - the old combined with the new - which comprised the industry." "... the main strength of Cooke's study is its clarification of the strands of diversity of the industry." "This is a careful piece of research in which the author reveals his mastery of a huge subject. Cooke is to be congratulated on his successful assimilation of evidence from a range of issues and rendering it accessible." "In a study which is so thoroughly researched and which so skilfully incorporates a diversity of themes..." -- .