Steven Pincus

In 1990, Pincus received a PhD in history from Harvard University. He is a prominent scholar of Early Modern British history,[1] and his work has focused on the 17th century, in particular the Glorious Revolution and English foreign policy. His book 1688: The First Modern Revolution has been praised as providing "a new understanding of the origins of the modern, liberal state."[2] The Economist named it as one of the best books on history published in 2009.[3] Professor Mark Knights called it "brilliant and provocative," for Pincus argues the revolution of 1688 was the first modern revolution. 1688 was violent and divisive; it represented not a coup or invasion but a popular rejection of the king's absolutist modernisation based on the French Catholic model. The Revolution, Pincus argues, expressed an Anglo-Dutch emphasis on consent of the governed, toleration of different forms of Protestantism, free debate and free commerce.[4]

In March 2010 he delivered the Sir John Neale lecture at University College, London. He was in Oxford for the 2010–2011 academic year working on the origins of the British Empire.

• 2018–present – Thomas E. Donnelly Professor of British History, University of Chicago
• 2005–2018 – Bradford Durfee Professor of History, Yale University
• 1993–2005 – Professor of History, University of Chicago

• "Popery, Trade and Universal Monarchy: the ideological context of the outbreak of the Second Anglo-Dutch War." English Historical Review (1992): 1-29. in JSTOR
• "Republicanism, Absolutism, and Universal Monarchy: English Popular Sentiment During the Third Dutch War." in Culture and Society in the Stuart Restoration: Literature, Drama, History, ed. Gerald MacLean (Cambridge, 1995) (1995): 258–9.
• "'Coffee Politicians Does Create': Coffeehouses and Restoration Political Culture," The Journal of Modern History Vol. 67, No. 4, December 1995.
• "From butterboxes to wooden shoes: the shift in English popular sentiment from anti-Dutch to anti-French in the 1670s." The Historical Journal 38.2 (1995): 333–361.
• "The English debate over universal monarchy." A union for empire: political thought and the British Union of 1707 (1995): 37–62.
• "'To protect English liberties': The English Nationalist Revolution of 1688-1689." in Protestantism and national identity: Britain and Ireland (1998): 75-104.
• "The Making of a Great Power? Universal Monarchy, Political Economy, and the Transformation of English Political Culture." The European Legacy 5.4 (2000): 531–545.
• with James A. Robinson. "What really happened during the Glorious Revolution?" No. w17206. National Bureau of Economic Research, 2011. online
• Pincus, Steven. "A Fight for the Future." History Today 59.10 (2009): 10+

• Faculty page at Yale University