Initiatives & Conference Fund

The Economic History Society maintains a fund to encourage otherwise unfunded workshops, special meetings and other interesting initiatives in economic and social history.

The Society is particularly interested in:

• Activities which might encourage wider participation in the Society
• Innovative research proposals
• Applications from researchers who are not full-time university academics
• Work which would lead to publication in the leading journals of our discipline
• One-day workshops which might provide sessions at the annual conference or generate articles for the Review

The Society will not make grants from the fund for more than £5,000 or £1,000 for a one-day workshop.

The Society will not normally award repeat funding if it is the sole funder.  In addition, all-expenses paid events (except those organised by PhD students) will receive low priority.

Please note that any award made would not cover:

• Conference attendance costs of applicant
• Equipment costs
• Publications costs
• Subsistence costs (i.e. food and drink) of applicant
• Room hire costs (where the venue is the applicant’s home institution)

Any surplus amount made by the event will be deducted from the grant made by the Society. Whatever the sum granted, there must be a specific prominent acknowledgement of the Society’s support in any publicity, meeting materials or publications. Any events held with support from the fund should be advertised on the Society’s website and, as far as is practicable, be open equally to all interested economic and social historians. Successful applicants are encouraged to propose papers or sessions at the Society’s annual conference.

Applicants must be members of the Economic History Society. Join here.  Note that the online application form will only be visible if you are logged into the website.

Questions concerning the objectives and criteria of the fund should be directed to the Honorary Secretary via the Administrators.

Closing dates for applications are on the first day of May and November.  Applicants will usually be informed of the outcome of their application within 6-8 weeks of the deadline date for applications.

• Past winners

  Examples of successful applications to the Initiatives and Conference Fund, as well as reports on the events, include:

  Workshops / conferences

  • Conference on: Food and the First World War
  • Conference on: Economic Liberalism in the Americas
  • Conference on: Emancipation, slave-ownership and the remaking of the British imperial world 
  • Workshop for Year 12 on: Making Histories
  • Workshop on: Colonial development, 1929-60
  • Workshop on: Communism and youth in the 20th century: between Socialist pedagogy and consumerism
  • Conference on: Distribution networks for textiles and dress, c.1700-1945
  • Conference on: Occupation and life experience
  • Conference on: Tawney’s agrarian problems 100 years on: landlords and tenants in rural England c.1400-c.1750
  • Conference on: From the sources to the discourses: postgraduate seminar series
  • Seminar: which was part of the Scottish Oral History Centre Workshop series

  Initiatives

  • Collaborative initiative to investigate: The history and geography of the English almshouse, c.1500-1914
  • A professional consultant to provide advice for initial grant applications: British Steel Archive Project
  • Extension of: European State Finance Database – for the employment of RAs to assist with the project
  • Old Bailey Proceedings Online: Webpages ‘For Schools’ Project
  • Completion of a new dataset on: The price of land in the early 17th century
  • Community drama project: Angels with manky faces
  • Public event marking Scottish women’s suffrage: Gude Cause Procession