Proto-industrialization, sharecropping, and outmigration in nineteenth-century rural Westphalia.
This article examines proto-industrialization and the social relations of production in a rural parish in eastern Westphalia that experienced large-scale outmigration to the American Midwest in the mid-nineteenth century. Relying on local and individual-level Prussian tax and emigration records, the study identifies and analyses the socio-economic background of the migrant cohort in terms of proto-industrial activity and peasant economy. Preceded by the downfall of domestic textile industries due to British industrial competition, outmigration was highly selective, drawing individuals from specific socio-economic niches. Landless sharecroppers - linked by debt and labour obligations to better-off peasants and landlords - were underrepresented in the migration, while smallholding peasants and day-labourers - 'free' to commodify their labour power through the sale of home-produced textile products or seasonal migratory labour - were overrepresented. The findings of the study have implications for an understanding of the localized nature of the relations of production in proto-industrial regions, the historical nature of German emigrations, and the dynamics of the German transition to industrial capitalism in the nineteenth century.
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D000383:Agriculture / Q000191:economics / Q000193:education / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D003132:Commerce / Q000191:economics / Q000193:education / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D018556:Crops, Agricultural / Q000191:economics / Q000266:history; D003906:Developing Countries / Q000191:economics / Q000266:history; D004526:Efficiency / Q000502:physiology; D054242:Emigrants and Immigrants / Q000193:education / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology; D004641:Emigration and Immigration / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D005858:Germany / Q000208:ethnology; D033161:Government Regulation / Q000266:history; D049672:History, 19th Century; D007221:Industry / Q000191:economics / Q000193:education / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D009111:Local Government; D012423:Rural Health / Q000266:history; D012424:Rural Population / Q000266:history; D012922:Social Change / Q000266:history; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013660:Taxes / Q000191:economics / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D014171:Transients and Migrants / Q000193:education / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology