The Culture of Credit in Eighteenth-Century Commerce: The English Textile Industry

Abstract

In this article, I seek to expand the relatively narrow focus of most work on commercial credit in eighteenth-century England by incorporating culture into an economic analysis. I argue that the various credit regimes that operated in the regional branches of the English wool textile industry are best understood as having a cultural dimension. A comparative analysis of business strategies in these regions suggests that the different cultures of credit had important implications for the development of the textile industry during the eighteenth century, shaping the character of the entrepreneurship of each region's merchants and producers.