Preconditions for the Making of an Industrial Past: Comparative Perspectives
01-13-2026
International Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition)
No.2, 2025
Preconditions for the Making of an Industrial Past: Comparative Perspectives
(Abstract)
Stefan Berger
This introduction is from Constructing Industrial Pasts: Heritage, Historical Culture and Identity in Regions Undergoing Structural Economic Transformation. It aims to explore, from a global comparative perspective, the multiple preconditions that enable the emergence of industrial heritage in a post-industrial context. Focusing on economic change, political institutions, and cultural mechanisms, the text analyzes how various countries and regions reinterpret, utilize, and reconstruct their industrial histories during processes of structural economic transformation. The introduction underscores that industrial heritage is not a natural by-product of economic decline, but rather the result of political will, cultural engagement, and the construction of local identity. It thus offers an important analytical framework for understanding how industrial memory is activated on a global scale.