Catalonia's Advocates

“Charts new terrain and offers a new perspective on the relationship between nationalism and the law.” — H-Urban Reviews

“Meticulously researched. . . . As the first social history of a continental bar, Jacobson’s study has much to offer those legal scholars, sociologists, and historians. . . . Will undoubtedly serve as a model for future efforts to analyze the role of professional groups — lawyers, in particular — during the ‘bourgeois’ century.” — Journal of Interdisciplinary History

“A painstakingly researched and admirably written account of the development of a profession, which provides a convenient case study of the European bar.” — Journal of Law and History Review

“[Jacobson] provides compelling evidence for his case for the superiority of a historical over a functionalist approach to the study of the Bar.” — English Historical Review

“Original and informative. . . . A vivid picture of the variety of social circumstances and professional opportunities that conditioned the life of lawyers in Barcelona.” — American Historical Review

“Catalonia’s Advocates is an impressive piece of scholarship argued with intellectual sophistication; it is meticulously researched, well organized and clearly written….Jacobson has written an innovative and challenging book that will change the way we think about the historical function of professional groups in `modern history.” — Social History

“Stephen Jacobson’s Catalonia’s Advocates is path breaking . . . . Makes a strong contribution to the history of the profession in Europe, adding a much needed infusion of a Southern European story.” — Bulletin of Spanish Studies

“Jacobson provides an important contribution to the literature on the history of European legal professions and to the theory of professions in the emergence of bourgeois society. He challenges historians to reexamine some of the fundamental conclusions drawn from research that has focused largely on France, Germany, and England. A sound and persuasive book.” — Kenneth F. Ledford, Case Western Reserve University

“Jacobson’s analysis raises important issues for urban social history and engages central questions of nationalism and governance in Catalonia and beyond. The author’s extraordinary care in detailed archival work and the links he makes between archival materials and other social narratives make this volume a methodological model for future research.” — Gary W. McDonogh, Bryn Mawr College