A Global History of Textile Workers, 1650-2000

The aim of this project is to write a global and comparative history of textile workers 1650-2000.
In order to do this, national overviews as well as thematic papers which have been written by several specialists across the world, were discussed at a conference in November 2004 and will finally be published.

In the first phase of the project, national studies were written on textile production in different countries over the period 1650-2000. To make them useful tools for international comparisons, these national overviews are based on a framework document which lists a number of topics/questions to be treated in each overview. Written papers are pre-published and made available to the other participants in the project on this website. Please click here for the national overviews.

In the second phase of the project, a number of authors of the national overviews has been invited to write a thematic comparative paper (on Globalization and Trade, Organization of Production, Space, Identity, Workfloor, Institutions, Production Relations, Gender, Ethnicity and the Textile Firm ) based upon the collection of overviews. These papers are also pre-published on this website. Please click here for the comparative papers.

The third phase of the project was a conference in Amsterdam, November 11-13, 2004, where the comparative papers were discussed by all authors of overviews. Please click here for the programme of the conference (word document, 30 Kb), the report, and a few pictures.

Finally, revised national overviews and comparative papers will be published.

The conference has been made possible through financial grants by:
- International Institute of Social History (IISG/IISH)
- Research Network 'Labour 1500-2000' of the Fund for Scientific Research Flanders (FWO)
- Foundation Unger-Van Brerofund
- Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW)

Missing overviews

The overviews for Belgium, Italy and Poland are currently being written. We are still missing overviews for France, Indonesia, and Australia. Please contact us if you are willing to write these overviews: in that case send a short proposal for a national overview (500 words max.) by email: or by fax: +31 20 6654181.
See the call for papers and framework document for more details.

Project team

The organisers of this project are Lex Heerma van Voss, Els Hiemstra and Elise van Nederveen Meerkerk.