The Rise and Fall of the East India Company

Mukherjee, a painstaking scholar and himself an Indian known for his numerous serious studies of Indian society and anthropology, has written here a colorful and important work on the Company, whose rise and fall constituted a classic episode in the history of capitalism and British colonialism. His… book is distinguished from most on the subject by its richly documented focus on social forces, Indian and British, that shaped the Company’s rise—and by some vivid descriptions of the impact of the Company’s long rule on the lives of the people both in India and England.”

—Publishers Weekly

Comprehensive, sociological analysis of the British East India Company which examines the period from immediately before its birth until its demise (1600 to 1858). Interest is in the social forces which led to the Company’s formation, its activities, and its eventual formal transformation to a British Government department. Specific concern is with the Company’s social background in England, events in England surrounding the formation of the Company, rivalry with other monopolistic companies, the social development of India and the Company’s relationship with Indian rulers, the Company’s rule of India, and the Company’s capitulation to industrial capital in Britain.”

—Journal of Economic Literature