Michael Kwass

Michael Kwass is Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University specializing in political and economic cultures in early modern France and the French empire. His research spans state formation, consumer capitalism, Enlightenment thought, and globalization from Louis XIV through the French Revolution.

He is author of three award-winning books: Privilege and the Politics of Taxation in Eighteenth-Century France (2000), Contraband: Louis Mandrin and the Making of a Global Underground (2014), and The Consumer Revolution, 1650–1800 (2022). His work examines connections between imperial expansion, global trade, consumption patterns, economic theory, and revolutionary origins.

Education: Ph.D. from University of Michigan