Chapter 14 Society and Culture, 1871-1914

Section 14.75

The Advance of Democracy: Socialism, Labor Unions, and Feminism

Introduction• Most people (especially liberals) in the

nineteenth century assumed that progress was inevitable and beneficial

• Advances in modern life– Science knowledge, new inventions,

economic expansion, constitutional government, expansion of the protection of human rights

• others pointed out that workers and women were not receiving equal rights

• New trends (socialism, feminism, unionism) emerged to gain progressive rights for their respective groups

• Other thinkers began to question the the certitudes of scientific knowledge and see limits in human reason (Einstein & Freud)

• IE. The Newtonian paradigm was about to be cracked

Introduction

Most people (especially liberals) in the nineteenth century assumed that progress was inevitable and beneficialAdvances in modern life

Science knowledge, new inventions, economic expansion, constitutional government, expansion of the protection of human rights

others pointed out that workers and women were not receiving equal rightsNew trends (socialism, feminism, unionism) emerged to gain progressive rights for their respective groupsOther thinkers began to question the the certitudes of scientific knowledge and see limits in human reason (Einstein & Freud)IE. The Newtonian paradigm was about to be cracked

Opponents of liberalism• Free markets and unrestrained capitalism was

challenged• Bourgeois (classic) Liberalism =Capitalism, free

competition, unrestrained private enterprise, Manchester School, laissez faire, free market were ideas that didn’t do much for workers, artisans and radical democrats

• These were ideas of Middle class liberals– Their philosophy was opposed by the Sans Culottes during

French Rev., English Chartists, all who were anti-capitalistic

• Socialism grew during 1848 as many workers hoped for a “social”republic

• Rev of 1848 failed but it frightened the ruling classes to adopt some social measures (extension of suffrage)

Workers used two options to improve their position:Some wanted to abolish capitalism

They became proponents of socialistsWanted to destroy their employers

Some wanted to bargain with capitalistsThey became proponents of unionism (labor unions)Wanted to keep their employers prosperousBargain for bread and butter issues

IE. A polarity of interests developed within the working class movement

Opponents of liberalism

Workers and intellectualsWho were the intellectuals (of the workers)?• were middle class (Marx, Engels, Blanc, Lassalle)• Tended to lean toward socialism• Held long term views

– Saw economy as a complex social system, view society as a whole, • Viewed worker as shortsighted and timidWhat were the views of the workers?• Tended to focus on unionism• Had short term view• barely educated, worked all day on manual jobs• more interested in immediate action like safer machinery, 15 minutes

more for lunch• saw intellectual as an outsider

The Trade Union Movement and Rise of British Labor

• Unions (combinations) had always been frowned upon or prohibited– Le Chapelier Act of 1791,

Combination Act of 1799 (of the British Tories)

• Ironically the rise of the bourgeois who had been insensitive to the worker (via laissez-faire) gave legal freedom to labor unions

• Gladstone recognized their right to exists in 1871

• French unions fully legal in 1884 under Nap III

New Model Unions• Prosperity of the 1850s was a favorable

environment for unionism • Amalgamated Society of Engineers

(machinists) in 1851 introduce new policy of unionism

• Made up of Skilled Workers• Said they would take unions out of politics• forget grand ideas of one big union (Owens)

and concentrate on the interests of each separate trade

• Use moderate tactics to leverage union interests

• would be reasonable with their employers, avoid strikes

• Surprisingly moderate • Conservatives and Liberals of England gave

worker vote in 1867

Forget grand ideas of one big union (Owens) and concentrate on the interests of each separate tradeUse moderate tactics to leverage union interestswould be reasonable with their employers, avoid strikesSurprisingly moderate Conservatives and Liberals of England gave worker vote in 1867

New Model Unions Unskilled Workers

• Great London dock strike of 1889 led to formation of unskilled Industrial Unionism– unionism within a certain industry regardless of the

actual task performed• Some skilled workers joined• By 1900

– 2 million union members in GB– 850 thousand in Germany– 250 thousand in France

• Ironically their success (in Great Britain) in collective bargaining slowed the development of the formation of a workers’ political party

• Socialism was much stronger on Continent than in GB (unions were successful)

• Avowed socialists elected to German, French parliaments

• “Lib Labs”=liberals who supported labor numbered about 6 in GB

• Trade union officials and middle class intellectuals formed the British Labour Party (around 1900)

• In Germ and France it was socialist party who formed unions, in GB in was the unions that formed the Party

• GB Labour party was less socialistic

• Wanted unions to be a respected and stable institution

Taff Vale decision• British courts ruled in 1901 threatened existence of

unions• Said that unions must pay for business losses if on

strike– Similar to Coronado case in US

• Pulled unions together into the Labour Party in 1906• Sent 29 members to Parliament in 1906• Taff Vale decision was overruled• New force in Parliament was driving force in the

liberal legislation of Disraeli, Gladstone, and D.L. George

European Socialism after 1850• 1867 Capital is published by Marx

• painstakingly research work gave substance to the Communist Manifesto

• Was a loner while exiled in England

• Didn’t mix with the labor unions and was relatively unknown in GB

• Das Capital (p. 1867) was not released in England until 1886

• IE. Little appeal and little influence on GB Labour Party

The First International• 1864 London was host to the first International

Working Men’s Association, known as the First International

• sponsored by diverse group including British carpenter’s union (Robert Applegarth), Italian revolutionary Mazzini, and Marx,

• Marx took control of the Association and used it as a Bully Pulpit for the ideas of Capital

• Later meetings he made Mazzinians unwelcome• Denounced the German Lassalleans for their

willingness to cooperate with Bismarck (opportunism)

• Said that Bakunin and anarchist of Russia were abhorrent

• Marx said that proper target was not the state (this was only a tool of the propertied class

• Real target should be the capitalist economic system• Bukunin was driven from the International in 1872

The Paris Commune• International watched and hoped that it was

the signal for working class upheaval• Some members went to the Commune(to

study it ?)• First International was labeled violent and

anarchistic• Marx praised it as well and said that the

Dictatorship of the proletariat was coming• First International losses momentum as this

frightened many• First International fades after 1872• Socialist parties emerge in many countries• They eventually formed the Second

International• Met every 3 years from 1889-1914

Revisionist & Revolutionary Socialism, 1880 – 1914

• Marxism or scientific socialism was most prominent model of the period

• Had attitude of hostility towards other doctrines

• Strongest in Germany and France

• Unsuccessful in Italy and Spain• Population was illiterate, and

less industrialized• More prone to insurrectionism

and anarchismInaugural Address of the International Working Men's Association

Fabian socialism in England• Marxism was weak here• Workers liked trade unions • Fabian Society =Middle class critics of capitalism

formed in 1883• Named after Roman general Fabius Cunctator “The

delayer” or strategist of gradual methods• very un-Marxist and very English• Formed by George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells, Sidney

and Beatrice Webb• Believed that socialism was the economic and social

outcome of democracy• Socialism was the inevitable outcome • No class conflict was necessary• Municipal ownership of public utilities would bring

about gradual socialism• Supported the trade unions

H.G. Wells

The Fabian society

Parliamentary socialism on the Continent• Marxism turned into less revolutionary

parliamentary socialism (except in Russia where no parliamentary gov existed)

• Workers may have believed in Marxism but they worked for orderly legislation benefiting the workers

• Sought social insurance, factory regulation, minimum wages, max hours

• Marxism is loosing ground• Although the bourgeoisie was getting richer

the proletarian class was not getting poorer• Wages were rising• Real wages rose 50% b/5 1870-1900• Food prices were falling

The revisionists• Marxism began in the 1890s to

be revised• Jean Jaures • Eduard Bernstein, author of

Evolutionary Socialism• They believed that class conflict

might not be inevitable• Capitalism might be gradually

transformed in the workers’ interest via democracy

• No need for a dictatorship of the proletariat

Eduard Bernstein

Syndicalism• A French word for trade unionism• Georges Sorel was its main

exponent• Idea was that the workers’ unions

become the supreme power in society (replacing property, market economy, gov)

• This power would be attained in a spectacular general strike

• Strongest where unions were weakest & had the least to lose (Italy, Spain, France)

Georges Sorel

Orthodoxy vs. Revisionism• Revisionism led to a revival of orthodox

Marxism • revisionists were labeled compromisers• Betrayed Marxism for bread and butter

concessions• Karl Kautsky of Germany used the Second

International to condemn French socialist Alexandre Millerand for joining the French cabinet in 1899

• Said that socialists could use parliaments as a forum but not join them

Karl Kautsky

V.I. Lenin

Lenin called for revisionism to be stamped outBolsheviks (majority at meeting of Russian Social Democrats)Revisionists were labeled Mensheviks (minority)but in 1903 who cared about Russian Marxists?Revolutionary Marxism quieted downMilder doctrines prevailed pin Europe inner zoneWhy?Capitalism worked well enough to raise the workers’ living standardsWorkers had the vote and could expect to benefit for governmentUnions were becoming more powerful

Orthodoxy vs. Revisionism

Feminism 1880 – 1914• As worker parties begin to spread

feminism became more of an international movement

• Issues• Equal pay• new industrial economy pay them less for

the same work• Restrictions on rights• Property• Participation in political meetings• Vote• Attend universities• France• Legal and social reforms were the focus• Women receive the vote after WWII• England and America• Vote• International Council of Women 1888• Susan B. Anthony• Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Suffragettes• Smaller families• promoted birth control as a means of freeing

women from childbirth prison• Quest for voting rights attracted most attention• Women’s Social and Political Union

– Sponsored petitions, Meetings, Protests, Demanded equal voting rights

• Especially militant in GB• Emmeline Pankhurst• Disrupted Parliament• Broke windows, mailboxes, damaged government

buildings• when arrested they went on Hunger strikes• police forced fed them with painful tube insertions• By post-WWI women (over 30) gained the vote