This is a completely revised edition of Payne's authoritative account first published in 1972, of the state of entrepreneurship in the nineteenth century, in the light of recent research. It examines in depth the validity of the widely accepted belief that there occurred a deterioration in the quality of British entrepreneurship during the course of the nineteenth century.

This landmark research volume provides the first detailed history of entrepreneurship in Britain from the nineteenth century to the present. Using a remarkable new database of more than nine million entrepreneurs, it gives new understanding to the development of Britain as the world’s ‘first industrial nation’. Based on the first long-term whole-population analysis of British small business, it uses novel methods to identify from the 10-yearly population census the two to four million people per year who operated businesses in the period 1851–1911. Using big data analytics, it reveals how British businesses evolved over time, supplementing the census-derived data on individuals with other sources on companies and business histories. By comparing to modern data, it reveals how the late-Victorian period was a ‘golden age’ for smaller and medium-sized business, driven by family firms, the accelerating participation of women and the increasing use of incorporation as significant vehicles for development. A unique resource and citation for future research on entrepreneurship, of crucial significance to economic development policies for small business around the world, and above all the key entry point for researchers to the database which is deposited at the UK Data Archive, this major publication will change our understanding of the scale and economic significance of small businesses in the nineteenth century.

"This volume challenges those who see gender inequalities invariably defining and constraining the lives of women. But it also broadens the conversation about the degree to which business is a gender-blind institution, owned and managed by entrepreneurs whose gender identities shape and reflect economic and cultural change." – Mary A. Yeager, Professor Emerita, University of California, Los Angeles This is the first book to consider nineteenth-century businesswomen from a global perspective, moving beyond European and trans-Atlantic frameworks to include many other corners of the world. The women in these pages, who made money and business decisions for themselves rather than as employees, ran a wide variety of enterprises, from micro-businesses in the ‘grey market’ to large factories with international reach. They included publicans and farmers, midwives and property developers, milliners and plumbers, pirates and shopkeepers. Female Entrepreneurs in the Long Nineteenth Century: A Global Perspective rejects the notion that nineteenth-century women were restricted to the home. Despite a variety of legal and structural restrictions, they found ways to make important but largely unrecognised contributions to economies around the world - many in business. Their impact on the economy and the economy’s impact on them challenge gender historians to think more about business and business historians to think more about gender and create a global history that is inclusive of multiple perspectives. Chapter one of this book is available open access under a CC BY 4.0 license at link.springer.com.

Aston challenges and reshapes the on-going debate concerning social status, economic opportunity, and gender roles in nineteenth-century society. Sources including trade directories, census returns, probate records, newspapers, advertisements, and photographs are analysed and linked to demonstrate conclusively that women in nineteenth-century England were far more prevalent in business than previously acknowledged. Moreover, women were able to establish and expand their businesses far beyond the scope of inter-generational caretakers in sectors of the economy traditionally viewed as unfeminine, and acquire the assets and possessions that were necessary to secure middle-class status. These women serve as a powerful reminder that the middle-class woman’s retreat from economic activity during the nineteenth-century, so often accepted as axiomatic, was not the case. In fact, women continued to act as autonomous and independent entrepreneurs, and used business ownership as a platform to participate in the economic, philanthropic, and political public sphere.

Offers insights into the motivations of the Victorian women who opted to pursue enterprises of their own. This book argues that industrialization inaugurated a commercial and retail revolution that is responsible for the creation of niche markets and service industries, expanding the variety of opportunities for women.