Shortlist for the First Monograph Prize in Economic and/or Social History 2024-2025

The Economic History Society awards a prize of £1,000, on a biennial basis, for the best first monograph in Economic and/or Social History. 

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One of the lovely things that the Society does is to celebrate the best research that is carried out in the field. This post is dedicated to one of two prizes that mean a great deal to everyone; and both are fiercely competitive.

The  Society is delighted to announce the shortlists for the First Monograph Prize, for books published in 2024/25, and for the Thirsk-Feinstein PhD Dissertation Prize.

I am grateful to the judges for the enormous amount of hard work that is involved in the judging process. The First Monograph Prize is judged by Regina Grafe, Sheilagh Ogilvie and Andy Seltzer.

Patrick Wallis (President)

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The Society is delighted to announce the shortlist for the biennial First Monograph Prize for the best first monograph in Economic and/or Social History published during 2024 and 2025.

Eligibility for the prize is normally restricted to books published within 10 years of the author having been awarded a PhD doctoral dissertation in Economic and/or Social History.

The winner will be announced at the Society’s Centennial Conference in April 2026 at the London School of Economics.

The shortlist is:

Dr Damian Clavel (University of Zurich)

Book: Financing Sovereignty: The Poyais Scandal in the Early Nineteenth-Century Atlantic World (Stanford University Press, 2025)

Biography: University of Zurich Faculty Profile

Dr Bart Danon (Groningen University)

Book: Wealth, Office and Rank in Roman Italy (Cambridge University Press, 2025)

Biography: University of Groningen Staff Profile

Dr Koji Hirata (Monash University)

Book: Making Mao’s Steelworks: Industrial Manchuria and the Transnational Origins of Chinese Socialism (Cambridge University Press, 2024)

Biography: Monash University Research Profile

Dr Charmian Mansell (University of Sheffield)

Book: Female Servants in Early Modern England (Liverpool University Press/British Academy, 2024)

Biography: University of Sheffield Academic Profile

Dr Tehila Sasson (University of Oxford)

Book: The Solidarity Economy: Nonprofits and the Making of Neoliberalism After Empire (Princeton University Press, 2024)

Biography: University of Oxford Faculty Profile

Dr Robert Yee (Yale University)

Book: The City’s Defense: The Bank of England and the Remaking of Economic Governance, 1914–1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2024)

Biography: Yale University Department Profile