Will Clement

I am a historian of modern Europe with a particular focus on the urban history of France. I teach on a wide range of modern British and European history course units, including convening two specialist course units on the history of capitalism.

My research explores the impact of capitalism on urban inhabitants during the nineteenth century. This has led me to focus on three distinct areas in my past and present research:

Urban poverty and inequality

Rapidly growing industrial cities saw plunging living standards, with pressure on existing housing stock not met by adequate public or private response. I have researched the space that the working-class home played in the class conflicts and relationships of the modern capitalist city, focusing on the history of rental relationships, health inequalities, migration, and the wider urban environment.

Family business strategies and industrial paternalism

My research has focused on textile cities which competed for the title of ‘the French Manchester’. This focus has enabled me to explore the history of capitalism through the lens of family business strategies, the transnational connections between firms in Britain and France, as well as the role of gender ideals within policies of industrial paternalism towards the working class.

History of the state and the political economy of welfare

Finally, my focus on the nineteenth-century city has enabled me to analyse processes of statecraft and bureaucracy in order to explore how governments sought to manage issues of urban poverty. I focus on the importance of social relationships between state administrators and the local political elites they worked with in order to explore how power worked, or did not, when implementing early welfare policies.

I have published widely on these areas, with past and forthcoming work in French History, Cultural and Social History, Urban History, English Historical Review and in an edited volume on the state in nineteenth century Europe. My first book – Inspecting the Home: Urban Poverty and Public Health in Nineteenth-Century France – is in production with Manchester University Press and shall be published in winter 2026-27.

My current research develops from these areas to compare the treatment and othering of migrant workers in industrial Britain, France, and Belgium in the nineteenth century.

I completed my undergraduate studies in History at Durham University, before pursuing graduate work at the University of Oxford. My doctorate was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Ralph Gibson bursary from the Society for the Study of French History. After finishing my doctorate in 2018, I have held lecturer posts at Royal Holloway, University of London, St John’s College, University of Oxford, and Brasenose College, University of Oxford, where I worked for the five years prior to my arrival at the University of Manchester in the autumn of 2024.

In the academic year 2025-6, I teach across the following course units:

Undergraduate

HIST10101 - History in Practice. 'Boulevards and Barricades: Paris, 1848-1889'

HIST10182/21202 – Capitalism in Historical Perspective, 1700-1913 [course unit director]

HIST10312 - States, Nations and Empires: Europe, c. 1750-1914

HIST20392 – Independent Research Project

HIST30970 – History Dissertation

HIST31721 – Ceaseless Revolution: France 1781-1871 [course unit director]

Graduate

HIST60070 – MA Dissertation

HIST65331/66531 – Capitalism and its Discontents [course unit director]

My semester 2 office hours (in Sam Alex N2.3) are:

- Tuesday, 13:00-14:00 (online)

- Thursday, 12:00-13:00 (in person or online)

Please email to arrange a meeting at [email protected]