BANKRUPT IN THE SHADOW OF THE “BELLE ÉPOQUE”. COPING WITH FAILURE; COPING WITH SHAME. BELGIUM, 1896-1914

Abstract

What role does shame play in the experience of being bankrupt? By examining the bankruptcy
proceedings and the life trajectories of 21 individuals in the region of Namur at the turn of the 19th
and 20th centuries, this article explores the burden of shame in such situations, and considers
how it influenced the future of these people and the choices they made to rebuild their lives.
While the term “shame” is rarely explicitly expressed in the documents of the proceedings,
it is nonetheless present in the process itself and in the trajectories of individuals. Faced with
the bankruptcy procedure, people were particularly reluctant to agree to “confess”, although
this was legally necessary. A minority went further by fleeing in anticipation of the discovery
of their situation. Once the procedure had been initiated, the revelation of the bankruptcy by
the press and confrontations with the creditors or the public sale represented further moments
of humiliation. In the aftermath of the bankruptcy procedure, few bankrupt people remained
in the same community. Shame affected their residential mobility by directing them to big
cities, offering the relief of anonymity and the possibility to rebuild their lives both socially and
economically. Going bankrupt could also play a role in splitting up families, but it could also
serve to push the bankrupt people and their relatives to fight in order to restore their honor.