Working-Class Radicalism in England

  1. Working-Class Radicalism after 1815

  2. Chartism, 1837-1848

Issues for Discussion

  1. What were the main tenets of Classical Political Economy?

  2. How did working-class radicalism analyse contemporary society and how did they explain the poverty and exploitation of the working classes?

  3. What economic analysis did working-class radicalism and Chartism contain?  How did the radicals of this era view class, private ownership and labour?

  4. Why did Chartism fail?

  5. What did Chartism contribute to future left-wing and working-class politics?

Reading:

Secondary -

Albert Lindemann, A History of European Socialism, pp25-34 (on Paine, Godwin, Bentham, Cobbett), pp64-66 (deal with origins of Chartism in the 1830s), pp70-71 (on Chartism)

John Boughton, Working-Class Radicalism, 1815-1820 and the Peterloo Massacre of 1819 (from the Encyclopedia of Labor History Worldwide, St James Press, 2003)

John Boughton, The Chartist Movement (from the Encyclopedia of Labor History Worldwide, St James Press, 2003)

John Boughton, "Working-Class Ideology" , from Working-Class Consciousness in Bolton, 1837-1842, BA Dissertation, University of Manchester, 1981 (And on reserve in Library)

E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, Preface (a Marxist account of the emergence of a distinct working class in England in the 1830s)

Eric Evans, "Chartism Revisited", History Review, March 1999

John Belchem, "The Politics of Chartism", History Sixth, October 1987

Gareth Stedman Jones, "The Language of Chartism" in The Chartist Experience, Studies in Working-Class Radicalism and Culture, 1830-60,  James Epstein and Dorothy Thompson (eds) (On reserve in Library)

The Political Background to English Working-Class Radicalism and Chartism

Causes of Chartism Information Sheet

Chronology of Chartism Information Sheet

On the economic and social background:

Raphael Samuel, "Mechanization and Hand Labour in Industrializing Britain",  in Leonard R. Berlanstein, ed., The Industrial Revolution and Work in Nineteenth Century Europe (London: Routledge, 1992), pp. 26-40

Primary -       

On Classical Political Economy:

David Ricardo, The Iron Law of Wages (1817)

In Defence of Laissez-Faire (c1840)

Radical Analyses:

Thomas Paine, Common Sense (1776) [Extracts]

Albert Fried and Ronald Sanders (eds), Socialist Thought. A Documentary History

Chartism sources: Bronterre O'Brien, Feargus O'Connor, B Wilson

For a flavour of the character of working-class radicalism, read:

William Hone, The Political House that Jack Built

A contemporary newspaper account of the Peterloo Massacre, 1819

For a more literary critique of contemporary politics, read:

Shelley, England in 1819 and The Mask of Anarchy

 

Questions on your reading:

Thomas Paine, Common Sense (1776)

  1. What distinction does Paine draw between Society and Government and what does he argue is the true purpose of government?

  2. How does Paine criticise monarchy?

Chartist Petition, 1837

  1. What criticisms does the Petition make of the existing order?

John Boughton, "Working-Class Ideology" and The Chartist Movement 

  1. How do Chartists justify their demand for the vote?

  2. What do you understand by the term "Old Corruption"?

  3. To what extent did Chartists criticise capitalism and how did they view the middle class?

Eric Evans, "Chartism Revisited"

  1. To what extent was Chartism merely "hunger politics"?

  2. To what extent was Chartism a coherent national movement?

  3. What were the strengths and weaknesses of Chartist organisation and leadership?

  4. What was the significance of Chartism?

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