In From Old Regime to Industrial State, Richard H. Tilly and Michael
Kopsidis question established thinking about Germany's
industrialization. While some hold that Germany experienced a sudden
breakthrough to industrialization, the authors instead consider a long
view, incorporating market demand, agricultural advances, and regional
variations in industrial innovativeness, customs, and governance. They
begin their assessment earlier than previous studies to show how the
18th-century emergence of international trade and the accumulation of
capital by merchants fed commercial expansion and innovation. This book
provides the history behind the modern German economic juggernaut.