As late as 1948 the leader of the Lancashire cotton spinners' union, echoing the sentiments of many of the leading actors in the industry, remained unconvinced that organizational and technical change was inevitable. “He knew of one firm with mule spinning machinery dated 1878 and he challenged anybody to deny that it was running quality goods in quantity better than any machinery used today” (p. 191). Although successive generations of economic historians have tackled directly the veracity of this claim, Alan Fowler brings—refreshingly—a social historian's perspective to the issue. Fowler argues that Lancashire's success in postponing or pushing back the inevitable was not only the result of a specific technology (indeed Fowler observes that the spinning mule reached its limits of adaptability about 1900), but also the product of social and political institutions and a culture of leisure built around the mill floor. Thus, while economic historians have focused at times narrowly on the substitutability of raw cotton and the range of counts spun, Fowler finds flexibility in the wider collective bargaining system, in the relation between the state and the industry, as well as in the scheduling of family and work responsibilities. It was a holistic system with many margins of adjustment that buttressed workers' ability to withstand cyclical pressure of wage cuts, as well as layoffs and industry downsizing. Such claims are not entirely novel, but Fowler succeeds because of his thoroughness in marshaling a wide variety of sources and anecdotes from secondary and primary sources, including trade union archives, the Cotton Factory Times—Lancashire's family newspaper—and life histories.

The book is organized on a thematic basis with 1900 as much the start as the midpoint of the story. Fowler begins with an overview of the rise of the cotton textile industry and its regional and organizational specialization between spinning and weaving. He then gives a brief history of the three main unions in the industry, representing spinners, weavers, and carders, before describing the intricacies of the piece-rate lists that were the backbone of the collective bargaining system. Workers' experiences across sectors and regions were not uniform and the industry had a high degree of occupational segregation by sex. Although eminently Victorian, Lancashire was unique in the high proportion of women at work. Life outside work complemented that within factory walls. Communities developed a range of social practices and leisure attractions, from the music hall to cooperative libraries, giving comfort and pride to Lancashire workers and families. They also provided an escape from crowded homes. Safeguarding these institutions and arrangements, pressure groups campaigned for economic and political reforms, although Fowler asserts that Lancashire would have had more clout in London if it had been as actively engaged as the coal mining districts. Many elements of the industrial relations system and community networks were well in place by 1900, if not 1870, thus providing the foundation stone of Lancashire's long nineteenth century that lasted until 1958, when Britain's imports of cotton cloth exceeded exports for the first time since the early years of the industrial revolution.

As often is the case among labor historians, the method of analysis presumes a concept of class formation as set out by E. P. Thompson. Workers were made by their own experience, and in the “process of that struggle that a solidarity and a collective identity was forged” (p. 208). The role of employers in shaping this identity is minimized—the debate on paternalism is bypassed—and the state's identity is passive, meeting competing demands on a first-come-first-served basis. Moreover, Fowler does not bring an international or comparative perspective to many of the issues he treats. Does Fowler miss other readings of his evidence? One is struck by the role of individual families as the basic decision-making unit. In this regard, the evidence fits well with Trevor Griffith's challenge to labor historians' common use of class in his recent book, The Lancashire Working Classes: c. 1880–1930 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001).

That said, Fowler's study contains many more rewards than drawbacks. The compelling evocation of family life and the heartfelt commentary on how cotton operatives dealt with health and safety issues are just some of the highlights. All told, economic historians will need to consult this book because it provides a coherent alternative explanation to conventional views of Lancashire's durability.