I am an economic historian and historian of capitalism in Britain, Ireland and the British Empire over the past two centuries. My research focuses on the political economy of the causes and consequences of economic slumps, financial crises and famines, as well as the contributions made by British religious non-conformity to economic thought.
My most recent books include The Great Famine in Ireland and Britain’s Financial Crisis (2022) and Calming the Storms: The Carry Trade, the Banking School and British Financial Crises since 1825 (2023). My next monograph, The Financial Crisis of 1847 and the British Empire, is under contract with British Academy Monographs. My research has won four major academic prizes: the International Economic History Association’s prize for the best dissertation in nineteenth-century economic history, as well as the Thirsk-Feinstein PhD Dissertation Prize, the T.S. Ashton Prize for the best Economic History Review article and the New Researcher Prize of the Economic History Society.
Prior to joining Regent’s, I was based at the University of Cambridge, where I was Junior Proctor of the University, a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow and an Affiliated Lecturer in both the Faculty of History and the Faculty of Economics. I was also a Fellow, Director of Studies and Tutor at Corpus Christi College, where I later deputised for the Master as chair of the Education Committee. I was also the founding director of the Corpus Bridging Course, the college’s flagship widening-participation scheme that quadrupled the share of student body from the most educationally under-served backgrounds. It was the first scheme of its type launched in Cambridge and has since been adopted by many other colleges. Before Corpus, I was based in Oxford as the Irish Government Senior Scholar in the History and Culture of Ireland at Hertford College.
My role in College
As Senior Tutor, I have oversight of academic matters throughout the College. I am also the Director of Studies in History and the Director of Studies for Economics. I teach a variety of courses for the History degrees and the PPE degree in Oxford, focusing on papers in modern political history and economic history. I also serve as the College’s Academic Support and Disability Lead.
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Selected Publications
Books
- C. Read, The Financial Crisis of 1847 and the British Empire (British Academy Monographs, under contract).
- C. Read, Calming the storms: The Carry Trade, the Banking School and British Financial Crises since 1825 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2 Jan 2023).
- C. Read, The Great Famine in Ireland and Britain’s Financial Crisis (Woodbridge: Economic History Society/The Boydell Press, 25 Oct 2022).
Articles and Research Papers
- C. Read, ‘The repeal of the Bubble Act and the debate between the Currency and Banking Schools’, in H. Paul, D. Coffman and N. Di Liberto (eds.), The Bubble Act: New Perspectives from Passage to Repeal and Beyond (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023).
- C. Read, ‘Reforming the Bank of England to tame inflation and boost financial stability: Lessons from two centuries of British financial history’, History & Policy (September 2022). [https://www.historyandpolicy.org/policy-papers/papers/reforming-the-bank-of-england-to-tame-inflation-and-boost-financial-stability-lessons-from-two-centuries-of-british-financial-history].
- C. Read, ‘The Political Economy of Sir Robert Peel’, in J. Hoppit, A.B. Leonard and D.J. Needham (eds.), Money and markets: essays in honour of Martin Daunton (Martlesham: Boydell and Brewer, 2019) pp. 71-89. [https://doi.org/10.1017/9781787445475.005].
- C. Read, ‘Taxes, tariffs and the economics of nationalism in 1840s Ireland’, in D. Kanter & P. Walsh (eds.), Taxation, Politics, and Protest in Ireland, 1692-2016 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019) pp. 199-226. [https://www.springerprofessional.de/en/taxation-and-the-economics-of-nationalism-in-1840s-ireland/16390672].
- C. Read, ‘The Irish Famine and Unusual Market Behaviour in Cork’, Irish Economic and Social History 44:1 (December 2017) pp. 3-18. [http://doi.org/10.1177/0332489317705461].
- Working paper version: C. Read, ‘Giffen behaviour in Irish famine markets: an empirical study’, Cambridge Working Papers in Economic and Social History No. 15 (May 2013). [https://econpapers.repec.org/paper/cmhwpaper/15.htm].
- C. Read, ‘Laissez-faire, the Irish Famine and British Financial Crisis’, Economic History Review 69:2 (May 2016) pp. 411-434. [http://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.12274]. [Winner, T.S. Ashton Prize, Economic History Society, 2017].
- C. Read, ‘The Repeal Year in Ireland: An Economic Reassessment’, Historical Journal 58:1 (March 2015) pp. 111-135. [http://doi.org/10.1017/S0018246X14000168].
- C. Read, ‘Ireland and the perils of fixed exchange rates’, History & Policy (February 2015). [http://www.historyandpolicy.org/policy-papers/papers/ireland-and-the-perils-of-fixed-exchange-rates].
- C. Read, ‘Peel, De Grey and Irish Policy, c.1841-44’, History 99:334 (January 2014) pp. 1-18. [http://doi.org/10.1111/1468-229X.12045].
- C. Read, ‘De Grey [née Cole], Henrietta Frances, Countess de Grey (1784–1848)’, Dictionary of Irish Biography (January 2014). [https://www.dib.ie/biography/de-grey-henrietta-frances-a9548].