Katherine Lynch is Professor of History at Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania. Her previous publications include Family, Class, and Ideology in Early Industrial France: Social Policy and the Working-Class Family, 1825–1848 (1988) and Sources and Methods of Historical Demography (1982).

'Much of this ground will already be familiar to demographic and social historians (though few readers will be familiar with all of it) but it is covered in a distinctively new fashion. What gives the book its originality is the context into which the material is put and the perspective which the author adopts … a valuable and stimulating new perspective on familiar issues … they carefully, but relentlessly, challenge some of the foundational beliefs on which modern demography is built and from which it derives its current identity within academia … Riley and McCarthy do a good job in capturing the main flavours … the book is clearly speaking to demographers, and about demography … This is an important book and, in many ways, overdue. Most of the fields that identify themselves as social sciences have been struggling with the challenges of postmodernism for some time … it presents a lively and persuasive argument for opening up a dialogue that would encourage greater reflection on the epistemological, methodological, and theoretical grounding of contemporary demography … this new book deserves to be read by all those who study population issues.' Elspeth Graham University of St Andrews, Population Studies

• Preface and acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Fundamental features of European urban settings; 2. Church, family and bonds of spiritual kinship; 3. Charity, poor relief and the family in religious and civic communities; 4. Individuals, families and communities in urban Europe of the Protestant and Catholic reformations; 5. Constructing an 'Imagined Community': poor relief and the family during the French Revolution; Conclusion; Bibliography.

Katherine Lynch is Professor of History at Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania. Her previous publications include Family, Class, and Ideology in Early Industrial France: Social Policy and the Working-Class Family, 1825–1848 (1988) and Sources and Methods of Historical Demography (1982).

'Much of this ground will already be familiar to demographic and social historians (though few readers will be familiar with all of it) but it is covered in a distinctively new fashion. What gives the book its originality is the context into which the material is put and the perspective which the author adopts … a valuable and stimulating new perspective on familiar issues … they carefully, but relentlessly, challenge some of the foundational beliefs on which modern demography is built and from which it derives its current identity within academia … Riley and McCarthy do a good job in capturing the main flavours … the book is clearly speaking to demographers, and about demography … This is an important book and, in many ways, overdue. Most of the fields that identify themselves as social sciences have been struggling with the challenges of postmodernism for some time … it presents a lively and persuasive argument for opening up a dialogue that would encourage greater reflection on the epistemological, methodological, and theoretical grounding of contemporary demography … this new book deserves to be read by all those who study population issues.' Elspeth Graham University of St Andrews, Population Studies

• Preface and acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Fundamental features of European urban settings; 2. Church, family and bonds of spiritual kinship; 3. Charity, poor relief and the family in religious and civic communities; 4. Individuals, families and communities in urban Europe of the Protestant and Catholic reformations; 5. Constructing an 'Imagined Community': poor relief and the family during the French Revolution; Conclusion; Bibliography.

Katherine Lynch is Professor of History at Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania. Her previous publications include Family, Class, and Ideology in Early Industrial France: Social Policy and the Working-Class Family, 1825–1848 (1988) and Sources and Methods of Historical Demography (1982).

'Much of this ground will already be familiar to demographic and social historians (though few readers will be familiar with all of it) but it is covered in a distinctively new fashion. What gives the book its originality is the context into which the material is put and the perspective which the author adopts … a valuable and stimulating new perspective on familiar issues … they carefully, but relentlessly, challenge some of the foundational beliefs on which modern demography is built and from which it derives its current identity within academia … Riley and McCarthy do a good job in capturing the main flavours … the book is clearly speaking to demographers, and about demography … This is an important book and, in many ways, overdue. Most of the fields that identify themselves as social sciences have been struggling with the challenges of postmodernism for some time … it presents a lively and persuasive argument for opening up a dialogue that would encourage greater reflection on the epistemological, methodological, and theoretical grounding of contemporary demography … this new book deserves to be read by all those who study population issues.' Elspeth Graham University of St Andrews, Population Studies

• Preface and acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Fundamental features of European urban settings; 2. Church, family and bonds of spiritual kinship; 3. Charity, poor relief and the family in religious and civic communities; 4. Individuals, families and communities in urban Europe of the Protestant and Catholic reformations; 5. Constructing an 'Imagined Community': poor relief and the family during the French Revolution; Conclusion; Bibliography.