‘Mingled in an almost inextricable confusion’: the panics of 1873 and the experience of globalization

Abstract

This article analyses the transatlantic financial crises of 1873 from the vantage point of the three countries that were most affected by it, Austria, Germany, and the United States, focusing on the experience of economic globalization and disintegration for actors on both sides of the Atlantic. It compares the perception of financial commentators and financiers of the panics in 1873, when the experience of integration was asymmetrical, and more pronounced in Germany and Austria than in the United States. It further argues that this asymmetrical experience of contagion shaped the monetary debates of the 1870s in all three countries. Focusing on the interrelationship and coexistence of experiences of integration and isolation, the article maintains that, despite the panics’ near-synchronicity, financial globalization remained difficult to see.