Cotton's Renaissance is an analytical and interpretive history of the responses of U.S. cotton growers to problems of supply and demand, and of the company they founded in the modern era to help them survive and grow in an increasingly competitive marketplace. The history turns on the story of how cotton growers learned, after more than a century and a half of trying to manage supply, that they could actually influence demand for their commodity. The impact of Cotton Incorporated, the company they founded, on the markets for cotton was a remarkable achievement in organizational entrepreneurship. Most basic American agricultural industries have their “boards”--beef, dairy, soybeans, even mushrooms and watermelons -- government-sanctioned agencies that promote the uses of commodities, sponsor research on them, and tend to the political interests of farmers who produce them.

Only in cotton is there anything like Cotton Incorporated, which is an independent, non-political company wholly dedicated to building markets for its commodity. Though funded by growers of cotton and importers of cotton textiles, it works to stimulate and meet demand along the entire chain of production and distribution, from planting cotton to its final sale in the form of retail consumer goods. In its “total marketing” effort to rebuild cotton's market share, it has fostered substantial scientific, technological, and managerial improvements in the quality and performance of cotton to address issues of profitability. In doing so, it has enhanced the efficiency of not only the farmers who grow cotton, but also all those who then transform it into fiber, then fabrics, and finally consumer goods.

George David Smith is Clinical Professor of Economics and International Business at Stern School of Business, New York University, and founder and President of the Winthrop Group, a consulting firm. In addition, he is an associate at the Center for Japan and U.S. Economic Studies and on the faculty of the Barkley Center for Entrepreneurial Studies. His previous books include From Monopoly to Competition (Cambridge, 1998), The New Financial Capitalists (Cambridge, 1998), and Wisdom from the Robber Barrons (Perseus, 2000).

Timothy C. Jacobson is a partner in the Winthrop Group, based in Fort Defiance, Virginia. His most recent book is Waste Management (Regnery, 1993). He is a founding editor of Chicago Times and an editor of Chicago History.