This dissertation uses the large negative shock to the British cotton textile industry, caused by the U.S. Civil War, in order to test three long-running questions about innovation. Chapter one provides the first empirical test of the leading theory of directed technical change, introduced by...

Using Lancashire textile industry company case studies and financial records, mainly from the period just before the First World War, the processes of growth and decline are re-examined. These are considered by reference to the nature of Lancashire entrepreneurship and the impact on...