Labor and Capitalism in Modern Egypt: Wages in a Sugar Factory, 1847-1904

This paper contributes to the global history of capitalism in rural contexts, examining the impact of agro-industrial mechanization on wages in African rural communities through a case study of a sugar factory in 19th-century Egypt. Utilizing approximately fifty wage registers from the Rawda factory in Middle Egypt, dating from 1849 to 1903 and now preserved in the Egyptian National Archives, the study offers a detailed analysis of wage trends over this fifty-year period. By focusing on the monthly wages of various labor categories—ranging from European and local engineers to factory supervisors and, notably, accountants involved in sugar production—this research traces shifts in the value of skilled labor. Preliminary findings suggest a decline in the relative value of skill over time, with technological innovation or labor shortages serving as key factors in any subsequent increases in skill valuation.

Adam Mestyan is a historian of the modern Middle East and the Ford Foundation Professor of Middle Eastern Studies in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University. His research and teaching focus on how globalization and war have shaped Arab societies and cultures—especially Egypt, Syria, and the Red Sea region—from the late Ottoman Empire to today. He is the author of Modern Arab Kingship – Remaking the Ottoman Political Order in the Interwar Middle East (Princeton, 2023); Primordial History, Print Capitalism, and Egyptology in Nineteenth-Century Cairo (Ifao, 2021); and Arab Patriotism: The Ideology and Culture of Power in Late Ottoman Egypt (Princeton, 2017). Currently he is writing a history of economic life in Egypt through the story of its sugar industry.