History 5: Lecture 16, Outline
New Social Formations: Middle and Working Classes
Introduction
Today’s theme: social consequences of the rise of commercial
capitalism and industrialization; complete reworking of the social
order>”three orders” replaced by three classes.
I Urbanization
• Massive urbanization of Europe in the nineteenth century:
| 1800 | 1850 | 1900 | |
| London | 1,000,000 | 2,685,000 | 6,500,000 |
| Paris | 500,000 | 1,000,000 | 2,700,000 |
| Vienna | 247,000 | 444,000 | 1,675,000 |
| Berlin | 172,000 | 419,000 | 1,889,000 |
• New industrial cities emerge: e.g. Manchester (pop.350, 000)
• Over urbanization>radical social dislocation of individuals-
II The notion of classes
• First usage as a political category is by the middle class
in relation to the aristocracy during the French Revolution
• Class appears as an economic category with David Ricardo (1772-1823):
land, capital and labor: classes in conflict because of their different
relationships to the means of production.
• Working class as agent of revolution (Karl Marx, 1818-1883)
but has to achieve “consciousness” of its mission.
III New Social Identities (I): Gender and the Middle Class
• Separation of the spheres of production and consumption
• Masculinization of production and professions
• Redefinition of the family; from patriarchical domain to the
private (women’s) sphere as opposed to the public (men’s)
sphere—
IV Making of the Working Class
• From peasant to wage laborer (1600-1850)
• Mechanization and specialization >factory system; discipline
(Luddites)
Work is time, rather than task, oriented
• No family wage : women and children exploited
• Urbanization+labor surplus> impoverishment (1800-1860)
• Common oppression> class consciousness (1830s)
• Standard of living: richer or poorer? Notion of relative deprivation
V New Social Identities (II): Gender and the Working Class
• No family wage; tension between the sexes in relation to work:
women and children used to undercut men’s wages
• The home no haven; social identity from neighborhood and pub
• Working class social life and politics are gendered masculine
Conclusion
Next time: how these new classes acquire a political voice for their
economic and social interests.
History 5: Lecture 17 outline
THE REVOLUTIONS OF 1848
Introduction
The massive socio-economic transformations of the first half of the
nineteenth century brought extraordinary political developments in
their wake.
I Europe after the French Revolution (1815-30)
• Reaction: European elites express horror at the terror and
specter of democracy: Joseph de Maistre, The St.Petersburg Dialogues
(1821): man is evil, vile, and corrupt. > needs absolute ruler
• Restoration: Congress of Vienna (1815): France: Talleyrand,
Louis XVIII, Charles X; Austria-Hungary: Ferdinand and Francis (Metternich);
Russia: Alexander I and Nicholas I; Bavaria: Ludwig; Prussia: Frederick
William; Italy: Leopold of Austria>European borders are simplified
and rationalized; settlement mixes balance of power and monarchical
restoration; first major redrawing of Europe since 1648 helps keep
general peace for a century (1914).
II Internal Restorations
* Russia: reaction>autocratic
• Austria-Hungary and Italy: Goulash of different nationalities;
monarchs are weak; ministers (Metternich) and the “Diets”
• Italy: Leopold rules; discontent with Austrian domination
• Germany: agglomeration of imperial cities and principalities,
Zollverein (1834); middle class under an old aristocratic state
• France; liberal monarchy 1815-1825; reaction 1825-30; revolution
of 1830>new liberal monarchy; Guizot: “Get rich” (enrichissez-vous)
III Political Culture of Middle and Working classes (1830-1848)
• Children of French Revolution: Karl Marx (Germany) The Communist
Manifesto; Georges Sand, Proudhon, Ledru- Rollin (France); Kossuth
(Hungary)
• Emergence of a labor movement and the limits of reform: English
Chartists: Feargus O’Connor; strikes of 1841-2
• Political issues: universal suffrage and social welfare
IV The Revolutions of 1848
• France: electorate =241,000; harvest failure (1847); Banquet
campaign (1848); February insurrection; universal suffrage; socialist
element (Luxembourg commission)
• Revolution in Germany: Prussian diet of 1847; Frankfurt Assembly,
March 31, 1848 (German Republic)
• Austria-Hungary: Insurrections in Vienna, Budapest, Prague
(March); Metternich resigns; imperial family flees
• Italy: nationalist uprising in Milan against Hapsburgs (Mazzini
and Garibaldi)
V The Failure of the Revolutions
• Old order keeps its armies and bides its time
• Divisions among revolutionaries (republicans vs.socialists
vs. nationalists)
• Urban revolution vs. rural conservatism (workers vs. serfs)
• Fear of workers >middle classes turn to old elites for
restoration of social order: e.g. French “June Days” of
1848.