Part I. The Modernity of Tradition: 1. Fashion as flexible production: the strategies of the Lyon silk merchants in the eighteenth century Carlo Poni; 2. The fate of fabriques collectives in the industrial world: the silk industries of Lyon and London, 1800-1850 Alain Cottereau; 3. The rise and decline of flexible production: the cutlery industry of Solingen since the eighteenth century Rudolf Boch; 4. Manufacturing flexibility in nineteenth-century Switzerland: social and institutional foundations of decline and revival in calico printing and watchmaking Beatrice Veyrassat; Part II. The Battle of the Systems: 5. Between flexibility and mass production: strategic ambiguity and selective adaptation in the British engineering industry, 1840-1914 Jonathan Zeitlin; 6. The lost paradigm: an Italian metalworking empire between competing models of production, 1900-1920 Alain Dewerpe; 7. 'Have a heart for the manufacturers!': production, distribution and the decline of American textile manufacturing Philip Scranton; 8. The small-holder economy in Denmark: the exception as variation Peer Hull Kristensen and Charles Sabel; Part III. The Resurgence of Flexible Production: 9. In search of flexibility: the Bologna metalworking industry, 1900-1992 Vittorio Capecchi; 10. Local industry and actors' strategies: from combs to plastics oyonnax Jean Saglio; 11. Producing producers: shippers, shipyards and the cooperative infrastructure of the Norwegian maritime complex since 1850 Hakon With Andersen; Index.