Changing Attitudes Towards Poverty:

Gustave Dore, Houndsditch (1872) Wentworth Street, Whitechapel (1872)

Investigators

• Booth: founder of Salvation army

• Andrew Mearns: ‘The bitter Cry of Outcast London

• http://www.attackingthedevil.co.uk/related/outcast.php

• GR Sims: report on the poor in London

Charles Booth

• Wealthy Liverpool ship owner

• Began investigation to disprove the claim that a quarter of Londoners lived in poverty

• Over 1 million families investigated

               

'Map Showing Degrees of Poverty in London for 1889-1890',

Booth’s classification of the people he interviewed:

A (0.9% in poverty)

The Lowest class-occasional labourers,loafers and semi-criminals

B

(7.5% in poverty)

The very poor-casual labour, hand to mouth existence, chronic want

C and D

(22.3%

In poverty)

The poor-including those who have small earnings because of irregular employment or poor pay

E and F

(51.5%

In comfort)

The regularly employed and fair paid working class

Charles Booth

• Shocked to discover that figures were actually underestimated

• 30% living below ‘poverty line’

• But only 10% been helped by Poor law

Bluegate Fields (1872)

 

Seebohm Rowntree

• Wealthy York manufacturing family

• Aim: to see if the level of poverty in York was different to london

• 1901 published Poverty, A study of Town Life

Nestle Rowntree

Key findings

• Identified two types of poverty:

• Primary poverty, those people whose earnings were so low they could not survive on them alone

• Secondary Poverty: those who had enough to live on but spent money

                   

     

Key findings

• Determined poverty line at 21s 8d (£1.08)

• Found York had 27.8% of its population living in poverty

• Poverty was not always the fault of the person e.g. low wages, sick, elderly

Significance

• Both investigators used new methods to study poverty

• Charity was not enough, the government would have to provide help

• Greater awareness of poverty

Pressures

• Employers e.g Rowntree, Lever, Brunner believed there was a need for action

• Politicians: increasing number ready to support state action

• Extension of the franchise to working class men (1867 and 1884)

                      

   

Pressures

• Growth of the labour and socialist societies

• E.g. Fabian society: Sidney and Beatrice webb

                   

     

Boer war:

• The British consolidated their power over most of the colonies of South Africa in 1879 after the Anglo-Zulu War.

• The Boers protested and in December 1880 they revolted.

• Boer: is the Dutch word for farmer

First Boer War (1880–1881)

the Second Boer War (1899–1902)

Boer women and children in a concentration camp

Boer war:

• many men unfit to fight• In Manchester 8,000 volunteered but only

1200 were accepted• up to 40% of recruits were unfit for

military service, suffering from medical problems such as rickets and other poverty-related illnesses.

Overall

• For all these reasons there was a gradual shift from self help and hard work attitude towards a ‘collectivist’ belief in social reform

• Activity

• What were the main causes of Poverty in the late nineteenth century

• Describe the work of Charles Booth and Seebohm Rowntree in changing attitudes to poverty in the early twentieth century