Money, Stock-Jobbing, and Corruption in England at the Turn of the XVII–XVIII Centuries

Abstract

The article reconstructs the historical context that shaped the financial capitalism in England at the turn of the XVII– XVIII centuries. It focuses on the crisis of Christian values and the development of secular rationalistic morality. The author connected the socio-economic context of England in the early modern period with the intellectual atmosphere of the late Stuart era and the early Hanoverian dynasty. The problem is considered from three points of view: (1) economic and political situation in the context of mercantilism, (2) the South Sea Company as an example of the interaction between the corrupt cabinet members and the London merchants; (3) social attitude, e.g., D. Defoe's The Anatomy of the Exchange Lane or the Exchange Trading System (1719). The epoch under discussion saw the emergence of a bipolar world of the poor and the rich in Western Europe in the early XVIII century, when the society of landowners replaced the medieval hierarchy.