The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence

From Publishers Weekly
The author of this profoundly important book achieves what most historians only dream of. He propels forward to a new stage of understanding a subject-the origins of the American Revolution-that is large, complex and vexed by controversy. Breen's thesis is quite simple: the colonists' experiences as consumers gave them the ability to develop new and effective forms of social action that eventuated in revolution. What's brilliant about the book is that it focuses on the slow development of the shared trust, brought about first by commerce and then by commercial protests (like "tea parties" and boycotts of British goods), essential to sustain a revolution over so large a territory and among so diverse a set of colonies. Trust is not usually a historical subject, but Northwestern University historian Breen (Imagining the Past, etc.) makes it critical to his story. There's much else to lure serious readers-insights, for example, into the awakening of women's political action and into how people can mobilize themselves for what they take to be the common good. But don't be deceived by fluent prose and diverting evidence. This is a demanding book, built upon a lifetime of learning, about a huge subject. It's also, by implication, of great current relevance. What's more, by putting economic boycotts into the center of the Revolution's origins, Breen revives an interpretive theme that's languished for 50 years. This, among many other features of the book, makes clear that those who may have thought that there was not much new to be said about the Revolution were wrong. 40 illus. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


From Booklist
What was the role of "ordinary" people in preparing the path to independence between 1763 and 1775? In examining the role of the masses, in what was truly a mass movement, some historians have focused on groups with a penchant for dramatic, even violent action, such as the Sons of Liberty. History professor Breen has chosen to emphasize the less spectacular but probably more important role of common economic action. Despite the vast cultural and economic differences between the colonial regions, most colonists were participants in an emerging consumer society based upon use of British manufactured goods. This was, in essence, an open market, in which goods, services, and ideas flowed freely. American participation in this imperial market created economic and even emotional bonds between colonists that transcended regional and religious differences. So when the time for resistance arrived, these bonds provided a network for communication and organized protest, including the startlingly effective use of boycotts of goods produced in Britain. This interesting work offers an original perspective and some provocative conclusions. Jay Freeman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
The Marketplace of Revolution offers a boldly innovative interpretation of the mobilization of ordinary Americans on the eve of independence. Breen explores how colonists who came from very different ethnic and religious backgrounds managed to overcome difference and create a common cause capable of galvanizing resistance. In a richly interdisciplinary narrative that weaves insights into a changing material culture with analysis of popular political protests, Breen shows how virtual strangers managed to communicate a sense of trust that effectively united men and women long before they had established a nation of their own. The Marketplace of Revolution argues that the colonists' shared experience as consumers in a new imperial economy afforded them the cultural resources that they needed to develop a radical strategy of political protest--the consumer boycott. Never before had a mass political movement organized itself around disruption of the marketplace. As Breen demonstrates, often through anecdotes about obscure Americans, communal rituals of shared sacrifice provided an effective means to educate and energize a dispersed populace. The boycott movement--the signature of American resistance--invited colonists traditionally excluded from formal political processes to voice their opinions about liberty and rights within a revolutionary marketplace, an open, raucous public forum that defined itself around subscription lists passed door-to-door, voluntary associations, street protests, destruction of imported British goods, and incendiary newspaper exchanges. Within these exchanges was born a new form of politics in which ordinary man and women--precisely the people most often overlooked in traditional accounts of revolution--experienced an exhilarating surge of empowerment. Breen recreates an "empire of goods" that transformed everyday life during the mid-eighteenth century. Imported manufactured items flooded into the homes of colonists from New Hampshire to Georgia. The Marketplace of Revolution explains how at a moment of political crisis Americans gave political meaning to the pursuit of happiness and learned how to make goods speak to power.


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The boycott movement-the signature of American resistance-invited colonists traditionally excluded from formal political processes to voice their opinions about liberty and rights within a revolutionary marketplace, an open, raucous public forum that defined itself around street protests, destruction of imported British goods, and incendiary newspaper exchanges. Within these exchanges was born a new form of politics in which ordinary men and women-precisely the people most often overlooked in traditional accounts of revolution-experienced an exhilarating surge of empowerment. The Marketplace of Revolution explains how at a moment of political crisis Americans gave political meaning to the pursuit of happiness and learned how to make goods speak to power.


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