Financialization, financial elites, and the changing genres of financial and banking history

This article undertakes a critical comparison of two books¬–Private Banking in Europe: Rise, Retreat, and Resurgence by Youssef Cassis and Philip Cottrell, and Financial Elites and European Banking: Historical Perspectives, edited by Youssef Cassis and Giuseppe Telesca–to explore how different genres of financial history and banking history have been written, and how the nature of financial history appears to be changing in relation to the rise of research on financialization and the social studies or finance / critical financial studies. The article argues that these genre differences are reflective of different methodological practices, theoretical and ethical concerns, and aesthetic preferences. The article concludes by arguing for greater engagement between financial history (especially that which intersects with business history) and the emerging research that embraces the social studies of finance.