For the sake of comparability, it is advisable not to develop new class schemes but to use old ones. Yet presenting a new class scheme - HISCLASS - is exactly what this book does. Unlike existing historical schemes, HISCLASS is international, created for the purpose of making comparisons across different periods, countries and languages. Furthermore, it is linked to an international standard classification scheme for occupations - HISCO. The chapters in the book show how historical occupational titles classified in HISCO can form the building blocks of a social class scheme for past populations. The dimensions underlying classes are discussed. How, for instance, can manual work be distinguished from non-manual work? Skilled from non-skilled? And what did 'supervision' really mean?

Building on ILO's International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO), presents a scheme of occupational titles of use for comparative research on the history of work. Gives data sources from eight countries, partly going back to the 19th century. Includes, where available, corresponding occupational designations in Dutch, English, French, German, Norwegian, and Swedish.

Endogamy, the custom forbidding marriage outside one's social class, is central to social history. This study considers the factors determining who married whom, whether partner selection changed over the past three hundred years and regional differences between Europe and South America.

This book analyses the international development of the census by comparing the history of census taking on all continents and in many countries. The timeframe is wide, from male censuses in the Bible to current censuses covering the whole population. There is a focus on the efforts and destinies of census takers and the development of methods used to collect information into the census questionnaires. The book highlights international cooperation in census taking, as well as how computerized access to census data facilitates genealogical studies and statistical research on both historical and contemporary societies. It deals with such questions as "Why did the French and British gentry block efforts at census taking in the 18th century?"; "What role did German censuses play during Holocaust?"; Why were the Soviet census directors executed as part of the Moscow processes?"; "Why did US states sue the Census Bureau in the 1970s?"; "How do wars and revolutions affect census taking?". The text ends by discussing whether the days of the population census as we know it are numbered, since countries exceedingly construct censuses by combining information from population registers rather than with questionnaires.

The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries witnessed significant developments in the structure, organization, and expansion of financial markets and opportunities for investment in Britain and its empire. But very little is known about how men and women engaged with these markets and with new opportunities for money-making. In what ways did the composition of personal fortunes alter in response to these developments? How did individuals make use of new financial opportunities to further their own priorities and ensure their families' well-being? What choices of securities did they make, and how did these reflect their attitudes to investment risk? What were the implications of a rapidly growing investor population for corporate governance and the regulation of markets? How significant is gender in understanding new patterns of wealth holding and investment? This interdisciplinary book brings together a range of leading international scholars to answer these questions and to develop important new research agendas. Foremost among these is a concern for gender, with several of the chapters exploring the growing importance of women within investment markets. These findings open up dialogues between economic and financial historians with social, gender, and feminist historians, and add a significant new dimension to existing research on women's economic agency. The volume also breaks fresh ground by analysing aspects of wealth holding and finance in British colonial settings: Canada and Australia. Understanding the extent to which global financial processes shaped the economic lives of those on the 'periphery' as well as at the 'heart' of empire will offer new insights into the social and geographical diffusion of financial markets.