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Cher(e) collègue,Veuillez trouver ci-dessous un appel à communication pour une session à la conférence ELHN de Turin en décembre prochain.CordialementAnne ConchonEuropean Labor History Network (ELHN)Turin, 14-16 december 2015Labour in European transport before the coming of the railwaysCall for papersAnne Conchon (Paris I University – IDHES) and Karel Davids (Amsterdam University)Although transportation is the backbone of the mobility and the dynamics of markets, its actors in pre-industrial times are still poorly studied. A recent issue of the International Review of Social History (2014) dealt with labour in transport in the Global South from the late 18th till the mid-20th centuries, but labour in transport in early modern Europe remains little known compared to labour in sectors such as industry or agriculture. Yet the growth of circulation of people and goods during the eighteenth century went together with a multiplication of transport-related activities which were conducted in a great variety of forms (haulers, coach drivers, coachbuilders, wheelwrights, postalmasters, freight forwarders...), modes of transport (maritime, fluvial, road and urban) and types of traffic (goods, passengers, mail and military equipment). In major trading places, the proportion of transport labourers in the working population as a whole seems to have been particularly significant.The aim of this session is to explore transport labour in Europe in the pre-industrial period. This subject involves on the hand similar questions as labour history in general (concerning for example polyactivity, occupational specialization, relation between forced and wage labour, gender discrimination...) but on the other hand also raises some more specific issues (such as regarding the role of mobility itself). Research on this topic requires dealing with sources where labour often is not immediately visible.The ambition of this panel is to deal with labour in transport in early modern Europe in all its dimensions (work organization, professional identities, conditions of hiring,rules on activity etc....). Questions to be discussed are for example : Where did the labour come from ? How was it recruited ? How was it organized ? What forms of labour relations could be found (contracts, remuneration, disputes...) ? What patterns of social and geographical mobility did emerge ? Were processes of professionalization and of specialization take place ? These issues will be addressed on different levels and scales : local as well as inter-regional, short-distance as well as long-distance.For each proposed paper, please send a short abstract of 300-400 words with the author’s name, affiliations, and email address, to anne.conchon@univ-paris1.fr and c.a.davids@vu.nl.Proposals should be reached by 8 july 2015, and notification of acceptance will be sent by 15 july.