Information, Institutions, and Local Government in England, 1550-1700

Abstract

Abstract Information, Institutions, and Local Government in England, 1550–1700 examines key shifts in local government when towns and villages developed information systems to levels of finesse that were distinctive. We have work on the central ‘information State’, but this book demonstrates that local magistrates relied on surveillance for what they called ‘good government’. England’s first nationwide system of incarceration inside bridewells developed over the same time. Government and regulation were turning inside, and a constant theme is the shifting balance and coexistence between ‘public’ (outside) and ‘private’ (inside) government and regulation. Age-old dependence on representing authority in public—‘manifestaccon’—remained, but many of its parts (e.g. civic rituals, clothing, or buildings) were coming under closer scrutiny. This was partly the consequence of sharpening ‘precyson’ in culture and government that put emphasis on being ‘exact’. One important part of ‘manifestaccon’, punishing petty offenders in public, began long-term transformations around 1600 with emerging vocabularies and practices of ‘private’ correction, whipping inside bridewells and civic buildings in particular. The steady spread of bridewells across England changed penal practices and cultures. They became indispensable for ‘good government’, with close conceptual and practical connections to developing local information systems through which quantification classification and recording made local government more effective. Based on research in nearly three dozen archives, Information, Institutions, and Local Government in England, 1550–1700 offers important new perspectives on local government, for example visual representation, penal cultures, institutions, incarceration, and surveillance.