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Dr James Taylor

Senior Lecturer

Degree: B.A., M.A., Ph.D. (Kent)

Associated research centres and groups: Lancaster Professions Network

Current Teaching

Hist280, 281, 300, 343

Research Interests

My work explores the social, cultural and political dimensions of economic change in Britain since the 1700s, focusing on the rise of big business in the nineteenth century. I am particularly interested in the ways in which commercial fraud shapes the public's perceptions of business and businessmen, how commerce has been represented in novels, plays, and cartoons, and the governance of large enterprises both before and after the foundation of modern company law in the mid nineteenth century. Essentially, my research seeks to chart the British people's relationship with, and understanding of, the changing capitalist economy.

Some of this work stems from research done at the University of Hull with Professor Robin Pearson and Dr Mark Freeman on an ESRC-funded project, Shareholder Democracies? Corporate Governance in Britain, 1720-1844. You can visit the project's website at: http://www.corporategovernancehistory.org.uk

I am currently writing a monograph on business scandals and the law since 1720.

Recent and Forthcoming Publications

Books

• Creating Capitalism: Joint-Stock Enterprise in British Politics and Culture, 1800-1870 (Woodbridge: Boydell Press for the Royal Historical Society, 2006). For further information, see the description at Boydell & Brewer Ltd. Winner of the Economic History Society prize for best first monograph in Economic and Social History published in 2006-7.
• With Mark Freeman and Robin Pearson, Shareholder Democracies? Corporate Governance in Britain before 1850 (University of Chicago Press, forthcoming, 2010).

Articles and Book Chapters (selected)

• 'Numbers, Character and Trust in Early Victorian Britain: The Independent West Middlesex Fire and Life Assurance Company Fraud', in Tom Crook and Glen O'Hara (eds), Statistics and the Public Sphere, c. 1750 - 2000: Numbers and the People in Modern Britain (Routledge, forthcoming, 2010).
• 'Review of Periodical Literature Published in 2008: 1850-1945', Economic History Review 63 (Feb. 2010), 219-27 (with Kate Bradley).
• 'Between Madam Bubble and Kitty Lorimer: Women Investors in British and Irish Stock Companies', in Anne Laurence, Jospehine Maltby & Janette Rutterford (eds), Women and their Money 1700-1950 (Routledge, 2009), 95-114 (with Mark Freeman and Robin Pearson).
• 'Technological Change and the Governance of Joint-Stock Enterprise in the Early Nineteenth Century: The Case of Scottish Coastal Shipping', Business History, 49 (2007), 573-94 (with Mark Freeman and Robin Pearson).
• 'Company Fraud in Victorian Britain: The Royal British Bank Scandal of 1856', English Historical Review, 122 (June 2007), 700-24.
• '"Different and Better?" Scottish Joint-Stock Companies and the Law, c. 1720-1845', English Historical Review, 122 (Feb. 2007), 61-81 (with Mark Freeman and Robin Pearson).
• '"A Doe in the City": Women Shareholders in Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Britain', Accounting, Business & Financial History, 16 (July 2006), 265-91 (with Mark Freeman and Robin Pearson).
• 'Business in Pictures: Representations of Railway Enterprise in the Satirical Press in Britain 1845-1870', Past & Present, 189 (Nov. 2005), 111-45.
• 'Commercial Fraud and Public Men in Victorian Britain', Historical Research, 78 (May 2005), 230-52.
• 'Greed: The Way They Lived Then', BBC History Magazine, 2 (Dec. 2001), 40-2.
• 'Private Property, Public Interest, and the Role of the State in Nineteenth-Century Britain: The Case of the Lighthouses', Historical Journal, 44 (Sept. 2001), 749-71.

Potential Doctoral Proposals

I am keen to hear from students interested in researching topics falling under the following headings:

• Economic, business and cultural history of Britain since 1800;
• History of financial fraud and crime more generally;
• History of joint-stock companies and corporate governance;
• The role of the state in Britain since 1800;
• History of advertising and shopping;
• Topics that explore the relationship between consumerism, citizenship and identity.

Don't hesitate to contact me if you would like to discuss your research plans.

Associated Keywords: Advertising, Britain, Business, Business history, Capitalism, Commercial law, Consumption, Corporate law, Corporations, Crime and society, Culture, Economic history, Eighteenth century, Fraud, History, Literature, Morality, Nineteenth century, Nineteenth-century culture, Nineteenth-century literature, Society, Twentieth century, Twentieth century British history, Twentieth-century culture, Twentieth century history

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