Summary Of The Crisis Of Feudalism By Jason Moore

In The Crisis of Feudalism, Jason Moore composes an environmental history to detail the downfall of feudal hierarchies and the beginning of proto-capitalist elements. According to Moore, the advent of the bubonic plague destabilized existing labor-land relations throughout the feudal system. The universal nature of the pandemic, coupled with the palpable population decline empowered laborers within the feudal economy. Moreover, this fundamental realignment of power among the various classes incentivized “an external expansion” to increase economic gains. According to Moore, the precipitous decline in population encouraged expansion to achieve the former level of surplus. Arguably, the expeditious nature of external fixes to internal lapses