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32 results

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  • SWADESHI CAPITALISM IN COLONIAL BOMBAY

  • AASHISH VELKAR
  • Journal:
    The Historical Journal / Volume 64 / Issue 4 / September 2021
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    14 October 2020, pp. 1009-1034
    Print publication:
    September 2021

  • This article examines economic nationalism in India, specifically the role of capitalists in late colonial Bombay. It shows how swadeshi was the fulcrum that supported the expressions of nationalism and capitalism. The notion that Indian capital needed to be used for the benefit of Indian nationals became established as nationalist thought by the 1930s. Such swadeshi capitalism – Indian capital for Indian industries – recasts the notion of swadeshi as a broader, more sophisticated cultural response to colonialism and globalization. As capitalism transitioned from mercantile activities to capital-hungry industrialization, nationalism was itself reframed from being anti-colonial in 1905 to being anti-globalization by the 1950s. Swadeshi capitalism helped to overlay a radical, grittier form of economic nationalism over the intellectually driven version of the nineteenth century. Swadeshi, as a form of economic patriotism, can be distinguished from similar expressions of nationalism within the British empire and dominions. This article is an effort to decolonize the narratives of modern capitalism by shifting the focus away from the global West. It will appeal to readers interested in South Asian history, and those interested in cultural responses to globalization, the contested nature of economic nationalism, and histories of capitalism in the global South.

  • “Spinning a Yarn”: Institutions, Law, and Standards c.1880–1914

  • DAVID M. HIGGINS, AASHISH VELKAR
  • Journal:
    Enterprise & Society / Volume 18 / Issue 3 / September 2017
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    06 March 2017, pp. 591-631
    Print publication:
    September 2017

  • The Manchester Chamber of Commerce established the Manchester Testing House in 1895, and introduced uniform yarn contracting rules in 1897. The chamber made these institutional “innovations” to deal with the nefarious practice of “short-reeling.” This case study explains how and why merchants were crucial to undoing weaknesses in domestic —and to some extent foreign—legislation to overcome this fraudulent activity. We argue that the Testing House and uniform contract were tantamount to developing a quasi-legal system such that private standards established through cooperative agreements had legal sanction. Our study shows how institutions evolved to improve governance along the supply chain for this highly specialized export-orientated industry. This article contributes to the growing literature on historical markets, institutions, and standards. Based on extensive archival sources, we show how specific and complementary commercial institutions developed within grounded notions of governance rather than abstracted spaces of market exchange.

Markets and Measurements in Nineteenth-Century Britain
  • Aashish Velkar
  • Published online:
    05 July 2012
    Print publication:
    25 June 2012
  • Measurements are a central institutional component of markets and economic exchange. By the nineteenth century, the measurement system in Britain was desperately in need of revision: a multiplicity of measurement standards, proliferation of local or regional weights and measures, and a confusing array of measurement practices made everyday measurements unreliable. Aashish Velkar uncovers how metrology and economic logic alone failed to make 'measurements' reliable, and discusses the importance of localised practices in shaping trust in them. Markets and Measurements in Nineteenth-Century Britain steers away from the traditional explanations of measurement reliability based on the standardisation and centralisation of metrology; the focus is on changing measurement practices in local economic contexts. Detailed case studies from the industrial revolution suggest that such practices were path-dependent and 'anthropocentric'. Therefore, whilst standardised metrology may have improved precision, it was localised practices that determined the reliability and trustworthiness of measurements in economic contexts.

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