Late Antiquity as Early Capitalism

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2158178
AutoresTom Bra (0000-0002-8565-2416, autor correspondente), Tom Brass
Ano2005
Volume32
Fascículo1
Páginas118-150
Data de publicação2005-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Journal of Peasant Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0306-6150 • E-ISSN: 1743-9361
EditoraInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/030661504200322411
OpenAlexW2008238855
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas7

Taking issue with the thesis (advanced by Weber, de Ste Croix, and others) about the link between unfree labour and economic decline in ancient society, Banaji claims that between the fourth and seventh centuries the eastern Mediterranean was characterized much rather by economic growth and the emergence of productive aristocratic landowners employing 'free' wage labour. These 'new' agrarian classes become in turn 'evidence' for the presence in late antiquity of early capitalism. The sources for such a reinterpretation, however, are either incomplete or wholly lacking. Locating capitalism in ancient society also reproduces the claim made by cliometricians that capital and labour are ever-present, historically non-specific and thus 'natural' economic categories that cannot be transcended

Agrarian society · Agriculture · Ancient history · Archaeology · Capital (architecture · Capital accumulation · Capitalism · Economics · Economy · Human capital · Market economy · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Reinterpretation · Wage · Wage labour · Classical Antiquity Studies · Historical Economic and Legal Thought · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Law