The Moravian Brethren in a Time of Transition: A Socio-Economic Analysis of a Religious Community in Eighteenth-Century Saxony

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Based on hundreds of archival documents, Christina Petterson offers an in-depth analysis of the community building process and individual and collective subjectification practices of the Moravian Brethren in eighteenth-century Herrnhut, Eastern Germany, between 1740 and 1760.

The Moravian Brethren are a Protestant group, but Petterson demonstrates the relevance of their social experiments and practices for early modernity by drawing out the socio-economic layers of the archival material. In doing so, she provides a non-religious reading of categories that became central to liberal ideology, corresponding to the Moravian negotiation of the transition from feudal society to early capitalism.

Author Bio

Christina Petterson is visiting research fellow at the Australian National University, School of Politics. She has published extensively on Christianity and socio-economics, and most recently co-edited Legacies of David Cranz Historie von Grnland (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).