engels: the condition of the working class in england in 1844 and the housing question (1872)...

8/10/2019 Engels: The condition of the working class in England in 1844 and the housing question (1872) revisited; Their rel

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ENGELS: THE CONDITION OF THE WORKING CLASS IN ENGLAND IN 1844 AND

THE HOUSING QUESTION 1872) REVISITED ; THEIR R ELEVA NCE FOR URBAN

ANTHROPOLOGY

Bernard Magubane

TH GH TTO

Is i t well that while we range with Science, glorying in the t ime,

City chi ldren soak and blacken soul and sense in ci ty sl ime?

There among the g loom y a l leys Progress ha lt s on pa l sied fee t ,

Cr ime and hunger cas t our maidens by the tho usand on th e s t ree t ;

There the master scrimps his haggard seamstress of her dai ly bread;

There a single sordid at t ic holds the l iving and the dead;

There the smouldering f ire of fever creeps across the rot ted f loor,

And the crowded cou ch on inces t , in the war rens of the poor .

Tennyson

The fundamenta l causes of th i s apparent paradox are in-

deed very diff icul t to decide. Basical ly, the poverty an d

suffering which reached a cri t ical level after 1815 were

the consequence of the es tabl i shment of a capi tal i s t order

in fa rming: tha t long t ransformat ion which was a l ready

decis ively es tabl i shed by th e m id-e ighteenth century . We

have had enough exper ience , s ince , of the economics of

capi ta l i sm to k now tha t i t i s no paradox, wi th in i t s t e rms

and i t s order , to have r i s ing produc t ion coexis tent wi th

wide-spread un emplo ymen t and subs tant ia l pauper isa t ion .

For in subject ing an economy to the discipl ines of wage-

labour and the m arket , i t exposes men to new kinds of

hazard, as i ts crises of credi t an d of prices work throug h.

Raymond Williams

The onditions Of The Working lass In

England wri t ten in 1844 and The Housing

Question

(HQ) w ri t ten in 18 72 -7 3 as a series

of art icles, are generally argue d to be clas-

s ics . Th is ar tic le re-examines the two works

Bernard Magubane i s Professor of Anthropology a t the Uni -

vers i ty of C onnect icut , Stor r s , C t .

*Al l quotes f rom Engels ' book, hereaf te r CWC, are t aken

f rom Marx and Engels ' ,

On Great ritain

(Moscow: Progress

Publishers, 1962).

0304 -4092 /85/$0 3.30 9 1985 Elseviers Sience Publ i shers B .V.

not on ly to demonst ra te thei r h is to r ica l im-

p o r t an ce fo r u rb an an th ro p o lo g y , b u t a l so to

re-es tab l ish thei r h is to r ic impor tance fo r cu r-

r en t u rb an s tu d ies an d th e u n d er s t an d in g o f

the poor and work in g c lass in cap i ta l i s t

so c ie ty in th e m o d em w o r ld .

Freder ick Engels was the f i rs t and fo r a

long t ime the on ly person to p rov ide a d ia lec-

t ical and historical material ist analysis of the

evo lu t ion o f the bourgeo is c i ty and i t s endem-

ic cr is is . Engels ' m eth odo log y and the ory re-

mains a sh in ing example o f the super io r i ty o f

the dialectical material ist analysis. In the mid

1840s, he a l ready u nde rs to od the ro le eco-

n o m ic f ac tor s p l ay in th e d ev e lo p m en t o f

so c ie ty . H e ex am in ed th e cap i t a l i s t m o d e o f

p ro d u c t io n , sh o w in g h o w i t sp aw n ed th e

indust r ia l u rban fo rces wi th i t s con t rad ic t io ns .

H e sh o w ed h o w th e b o u rg eo i s a f f lu en ce was

th e d i a l ec t i ca l o p p o s i t e o f t h e p o v er ty o f t h e

masses o f the peop le who langu ished in the

urban s lums.


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4 4

SOCI LIST CL SSIC

M arx and L en in he ld bo th the C W C and the

HQ in the highes t es teem. In these books

Engels not only surveyed the or igin and

h i s to ry o f t he Indus t ri a l R evo lu t ion , bu t even

more he asked the crucia l ques t ion in sc ien-

t i f ic d iscourse : Ho w did th is s ta te of af fai rs

a r ise? and H ow wi ll i t end ? B y s tudy ing

the cha rac t e r o f E ng l i sh soc ie ty p r io r t o the

Indust r ia l Revolut ion, Engels was able to

show how the s i tua t ion tha t he w as desc r ibing

and ana lyz ing w as the inev i t ab le ou tcom e o f

a m o d e o f p r o d u c t i o n w h o s e d y n a m i c d e -

p r ived the im m edia t e p roduce r s o f t he i r

m eans o f l i ve l ihood and r educed them to a

s i tua t ion w here the i r on ly op t ion w as e i the r

death thro ugh s tarvat ion o r the sa le of the i r

labor to the capi ta l i s t . The

monopolizat ion

of a l l means of subsis tence by the capi ta l i s t

c lass was the source of the in jus t ice and

dis tress o f the work ing c lass in the a t rociou s

s lums in Engl ish c i t ies dur ing the Indust r ia l

R evo lu t ion .

In 1883, in an in t ro du ct io n to a new edi -

t i on o f t he Communist Manifesto of 1848,

Engels wrote th at even before 1845 he had

been approach ing the m a te ri a l is t concep t io n

o f h i s to r y . M y b o o k o n The Condit ions Of

The Working Class In England

show s how far

I had t ravel led a long the road by mysel f . In

1867 Marx declared that the ful lness of

Engels ' s ins ight in to the nature o f the capi ta l -

i s t m e t h o d o f p r o d u c t i o n h a s b e e n s h o w n b y

the f ac to ry r epor t s , t he r epor t s on m ines , e t c. ,

t ha t have appea red s ince the pub l i ca t ion o f

his boo k [ 1 ] . L enin expressed the view that :

T h e b o o k ( T h e C o n d i t io n s O f T h e W o r k in g

Class In England) was a ter r ib le indic tment of

capital ism and the middle classes . . . I t made a

pro fo und im press ion upo n the m inds o f a ll w ho

read i t . Everywhere Engels ' s s tudy came to be

regarded as the bes t avai lable contemporary

accoun t o f t he cond i t ion o f t he p ro le t a r i a t .

A nd indeed ne i the r be fo re nor a f te r 1845 had

the depressed cond i t ions o f t he w orke r s been

so sha rp ly and accura t ely de l inea ted [2 ] .

F ran tz M ehr ing sa id tha t T he m os t ad-

m i rab le and a t t he sam e t im e the m os t no te -

w or thy h i s to r i ca l f ea tu re o f t he book i s t he

t h o r o u g h n e s s w i t h w h i c h t h e t w e n t y - f o u r

yea r o ld au th or [E nge ls ] unde r s tood the

sp i ri t o f t he cap it a li s t m o de o f p roduc t i on

and succeeded in exp la in ing i t f rom n o t on ly

the r i se , but a lso the decl ine of the bour-

geoisie , no t only th e m isery of the prole tar ia t

but a lso i t s sa lvat ion. The a im of the book

was to show how large-scale indust ry created

the m odem w ork ing c l a s s , a s a dehum anized ,

physical ly shat tered race , degraded in te l lec-

tual ly and moral ly to th e po int o f bes tia l-

i ty . . . [3] .

Are these fu l l some pra ises of Engels ' works

dese rved? W ha t can u rban an th ropo log i s t s

l ea rn f rom i t ? F or H obsbaw m the C W C

deserves a number of accolades f i rs t as a

sociological investigation. First ly, i t was, as

Engels h ims el f jus t ly c la imed, the f i rst bo ok

in B r i t a in o r any o the r coun t ry w hich dea l t

wi th the workin g c lass as a whole and no t

merely wi th par t icular sec t ions and indust r ies .

S econd ly , and m ore im por t an t , i t w as no t

merely a survey of working-class condi t ions ,

bu t a genera l analysis of the evolut io n of

indust r ia l capi ta l i sm, of the socia l impact of

indust r ia l iza t ion and i t s pol i t ica l and socia l

consequences - i nc lud ing the r igh ts o f t he

l abor m ovem e nt . In f ac t it was the f i rs t

large-scale a t tempt to apply the Marxis t

m e t h o d t o th e c o n c r e te s t u d y o f s o c i e t y [ 4 ] .

With the ci t ies everywhere facing crises, the

s tudy of Engels ' works i s more than a fasc i -

nat ing divers ion. The poss ibi l i t ies and l imi ta-

t ions o f u rban a n th rop o logy and soc io logy are

revealed in Engels ' work. Yet , wi th a few

notable except ions , urbanologis ts have re-

m a ined ind i f f e ren t t o the ques t ions E nge l s

ra ised. What Engels achieved a lmost a hun-

dred and f i f ty years ago was to suggest a way

to unders tand the urban cr ises and s lum for-

mat ion in capi ta l i s t socie ty based upon a

c lose s tudy o f em pi r ica l m a te r i a l i n fo rm ed by

the newly emerging mater ia l i s t perspect ive .


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In that sense the CWC provides the guidelines

for a future Marxist interpretation of the

process of urbanizat ion.

C O U N T R Y A N D C I T Y IN H I ST O R Y

Cou ntr y and City, Raymo nd Williams

[5] tells us, are powerfu l words, and anthro-

pologists and sociologists often contrast them

in terms of their meaning and implication for

human existence. Among those social scien-

tists who have attempted to define urban

society and contrasted it with rural commun-

ity are T~Sennies, Weber, Durkheim, Cooley,

Redfield, etc. The Cou ntr y and City are

often seen as ideal types or poles and societies

are ranged along the two poles according to

their complexity and development. TiSennies

distinguished Gemeinschaft from Gesellschaft

type societies, Weber called his two poles

Wesenwille and Kfirwille Durkheim distin-

guished mechanical from organic solidarity;

Cooley distinguished between societies with

primary and those with sec ondary relations

and Redfield between folk and urban society.

Currently, for some, North America and

Europe represent the Cit y and Africa, Asia

and Latin America the Count ry. These

formal distinctions are however ahistorical ab-

stractions and do not tell us how change itself

came about from one pole of existence to the

other. In point of fact, these dichotomies

tend to shift our attention away from real

historical processes and have become an

element of a very powerful myth of urban

sociology and anthropology in which the

transition from a rural to an industrial society

is seen (depending on one's ideological pre-

disposition) either as a movement from back-

wardness to modernity or as a kind of fall,

the true cause and origin of social and moral

decay.

For Engels, scientific analysis of industrial

capitalism had to begin with what Therborn

calls the historico-material and concrete ex-

perience, i.e., the study of social reality as

45

motion and process [6]. There took place in

England a series of interlocking and mutually

enhancing changes and developments in the

seventeenth century that culminated in the

Industrial Revolution in the early nineteenth

century. The consequences of the technol-

ogies and innovations of the middle of the

eighteenth century were of an unprecedented

magnitude, for they ushered in a revolution

that transfor med the entire structure of civil

society.

Bourgeois social scientists never tire of accusing Marx and

Engels of arriving at these conclusions a priori and of

ignoring empirical facts. The CWC shows th at this charge

is untenable. Long before the appearance of empirical

sociology and anth ropolo gy Engels engaged in concrete

social research and based his theoretical

o n l u s i o n s o n

the analysis and summing-up of facts which bourgeois

sociologists usually ignored [7 ].

In his historical survey of pre-industrial

Britain, Engels focused on the unique eco-

nomic transformations that occurred from the

fifteenth century and its social consequences

not only for rural England but for the entire

part of the world that was brought within the

orbit of British influence. He found that an

increasingly capitalist form of agriculture had

in effect become the pacesetter for the capi-

talist development of England and the world.

Since England was the classical ground of

the Industrial Revolution and where the

gigantic thrust of concentration and polariza-

tion took place, Engels used it as a case to

study in all its fullness the development of

its principal result, the proletariat. The indus-

trial revolution was thus more than a revolu-

tion in machinery, its most important result

was the creation of the revolutionary prole-

tariat. It was this emergence, this produc-

tion, this creation of a new human being and

of the new class of social beings that was the

explicit object of the CWC [8].

Although it was not Engels' aim to write

the history of the Industrial Revolution, he

believed it necessary to establish some con-

ception of the pre-historic state of English


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46

rural society and o f the general conditions be-

fore the great transformation. The kind of life

he describes is a familiar one to sociologists

and anthropologists; it was of small-scale

farming and domestic industry. The basic

form of property was land, and competition

of the peasant producers among themselves

did not exist because of rural dispersion of

their homes and the economy that supported

them. The peasant lives were comfortable,

peaceful and uneventful; they were pious and

honest men; and their material condition was

better by far than that of their successors.

Their hours of work were not excessive; they

had time for traditional recreation, and their

health and that of their children were good.

Socially their world was laid out for them:

it was prescriptive and patriarchal [9]. This

is how Engels described it:

They regarded the ir squire , the grea tes t landholder of the

reg ion , as the ir na tura l super ior ; they asked for advice

f rom him, la id the ir small d isputes before h im for se t t le -

ment , and gave h im a l l honor , as th is pa tr ia rcha l r e la t ion

involved . They were respec tab l e people , good husbands

and fa ther s , led mora l l ives because they had no tempta-

t ion to be immora l , the re be ing no grogger ies or low

houses in the ir v ic in i ty and because the hos t , a t whose

Inn they now and then quenched the ir th ir s t , was a lso a

respec tab le man, usua l ly a la rge tenant f a rmer who took

pr ide in good order , good beer and ear ly hours (p . 37) .

The development of the capitalist urban-

industrial order disrupted this mode of exis-

tence: in many ways the destruction was

comparable in terms of its impact to the inva-

sion of the colonial world by capitalism. The

enclosure movement dislodged thousands of

families from the country and they had no

alternative but to flock to the towns. For

Engels the most important result of these

developments was the separation of the direct

producers from the land and their settlement

in urban centers as proletarians where they

were ranged against the capitalist owners of

the factories where they worked.

The rap id ex tens ion of manufac tur ing demanded hands ,

wages rose , and t roops of workmen migra ted f rom the

agr icu l tura l d is t r ic ts to the towns . Popula t ion mult ip l ied

enormous ly , near ly a l l the increase took p lace in the

pro le ta r ia t . Thus a rose the grea t manufac tur ing an d com-

merc ia l c i t ies of the Br i t ish Empire , in which a t leas t

three- four ths of the popula t ion be long to the working-

class, while the lower middle-class consists only of small

shop-keepers , and very few handic ra f tsmen (pp . 49-50) .

Engels did not bemoan the passing away

of traditiona l society. He characterized the

mode of human existence in pre-industrial

Britain as follows:

They [ the rura l dwelle rs ] were comfor tab le in the ir

s i len t vege ta t ion , and but for the Indus tr ia l Revolu t ion

they would never have emerged f rom th is ex is tence ,

which , cos i ly romant ic as i t was , was never theless no t

wo r th y o f h u ma n b e in g s . I n t r u th , th e y we r e n o t h u ma n

be ings ; they were m ere ly to i l ing m achines in the serv ice

of the few ar is tocra ts who guided h is tory down to tha t

t ime . The Indus tr ia l Revolu t ion has s imply ca r r ied th is

out to i ts log ica l end by making the workers machines

pure and s imple, tak ing f rom them the las t t r ace of inde-

pendent ac t iv i ty , and so forc ing them to th ink and

d e ma n d a p o s i tio n wo r th y o f me n ( p p . 3 7 - 3 8 ) .

Having characterized the social structure o f

pre-industrial England, Engels then p roceeded

to logically summarize the early history o f the

Industrial Revolution. The aim of this resum6

was to show the impact of the new industrial

technology. The first group of technological

innovations set in moti on a series of elaborate

differentiations. For example, the invention

of the spinning and the power-loom not only

altered the relations between weaving and

spinning, and weavers and spinners; it affected

the division of labor in the family as well, and

therefore had consequences in the structure

of the household, and its internal balance of

force. Other developments that followed were

the assembly of large numbers of power

driven machines in the factories. These

machines required large numbers of workers

to man them. As a result shifts took place,

population increased, conditions of employ-

ment altered and the nature of wealth chang-

ed as well [ 10].


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Even though Engels focused on the growth

of the cotton industry - the prime mover of

industrial development - he did not neglect

parallel developments in other branches of

textile manufacture; in metal work, minerals

and mining, in agriculture, and in transport -

roads, canals, and railways - nor did he fail to

mention developments in commerce and the

expansion of overseas and colonial markets.

All these developments were connected in the

sense that they formed part of a large com-

plex and continually changing coherent whole

now called industria l soc iety [ 11 ].

The history of the Industrial Revolution

was thus cumulative and was produced by

a process of conquest of the country by the

urban-based bourgeoisie. Williams [ 12] says

that before and during the Industrial Revolu-

tion rural England was characterized by an in-

creasing penetration by capitalist social rela-

tions and dominance of the market, because

these had been powerfully evolving within its

own structure for a long time. By the late eight-

eenth century there existed in England an

organized capitalist society, in which what

happened to the market, anywhere, whether

in industrial or agricultural production,

worked its way through to the town and

count ry alike, as parts o f a single crisis.

Engels' investigation of the evolution of

capitalism in England brought into silent

relief the role of technology in the industrial

revolution and its implication for a basic

indus try - cotton. With the increased mecha-

nization of the spinning process, the work

of spinning was further rationalized by the

machines driven by mechanical rather than

human power. Water power, a source of

mechanical energy, brought men together in

large numbers in cities like Manchester.

These immense cotton spinning factories or mills of the

late eig hteenth century were something new in the world.

After 1815 weaving was increasingly brought into fac-

tories as well and within a short time cott on became the

first industry in which production was wholly mechanized.

47

The next step was to adopt the men women and children

who worked at the machines to the unvarying require-

ments o f those instruments and this too was achieved

although the ado pters ran into some resistance on the part

of adoptees [ 13].

The historical experience of industrializa-

tion according to Engels was not to be sep-

arated from that of urbanization. The two in

the case of England happened together and

reinforced one another; the reciprocating

effects of each upon the other being further

intensified by the demographic escalation. To

form some idea of how the capitalist city

shaped human life, it is important to study

the dialectic of the commo dity relationship

and the mode of urban existence it yields:

The industrial disciplines the conditions of work of

employm ent continual insecurity and continual com-

petition are not to be segregated in their effects as

formative experience from the conditions of living in the

new industrial towns from the housing sanitary provi-

sions - or lack of them - institutions of relief or welfare

or lack of them - from all the new densities and stresses

of existence in these unparalleled circumstances. The

working men and women who came out at the end of

their process were the first to go through what we now

understand as a world historical experience. As a group

they bear the marks of survivors. They bear those marks

to this very day [1 4].

The internal dynamic of economic trans-

formation in England became linked as well

to the colonialization movement. Within the

developing territorial division of labor, the

towns and cities of England had unlimited

elbow room to grow as workshops of the

world . Elaborating on the historical impac t

of the Industrial Revolution for England

Engels wrote:

Sixty eighty years ago England was a coun try llke every

other with small towns few and simple industries and a

thin but proportionally large agricultural population

Today it is a country like no other with a capital o f

two and a half million inhabitants; with vast manufactur-

ing cities; with an industry that supplies the world and

produces almost everything by means of the most com-

plex machinery; with an industrious intelligent dense

population of which two-thirds axe employed in trade


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METHODS OF INVESTIG TION

Participant Observation

T o g e t an in t im a te acq u a in tan ce w i th

Manchester, Engels used various strategies

w h ich h av e s in ce b eco m e th e co m m o n s to ck

o f an th ro p olo g i s t s . In a d ed ica t io n to T h e

Work ing Class Of Great Br i ta in which he

wro te in Eng l ish and p ref ixed to the o r ig inal

G erm an ed i t io n o f 1 8 4 5, E n ge l s w ro te th a t

dur ing h is s tay in Eng land he purposefu l ly

fo r so o k th e co m p an y an d d in n e r p a r ti e s , t h e

p o r tw in e an d ch am p ag n e o f t h e m id dle -c l as ses,

and devo ted my le isu re hours a lmost exclu -

s ively to the in tercourse wi th p la in work ing

m en ; I am b o t h g l ad an d p ro u d o f h av ing

done so . He wan ted , he says, to see yo u in

y o u r o w n h o m es , t o o b se rv e y o u in y o u r

every-day li fe, to cha t wi th y ou on you r con-

d i t ion and g r ievances, to wi tness you r st rug-

g les agains t the socia l and po l i t ica l power o f

yo ur opp ressor . Tha t i s, Engels ' s tud y was

based on the s tudy o f l iv ing peop le and thei r

l iv ing cond i t ions . And because he had acted

co n sc io u s ly u p o n th a t d es i re , h e w as in d u ced

to sp en d m an y a h ap p y h o u r in o b ta in ing a

k n o w led g e o f th e rea li ti e s o f l i f e (p p . 3 3 6 -

337).

Engels a lso gained the in t imacy o f Man-

chester by tak ing to the s t ree ts ; a t a l l hours o f

the day and n igh t , on weeke nds and ho l idays .

H e to o k to th e n e t w o rk o f p a th w ay s a lon g

w h ich th e c i ty m o v es an d th a t co n s t i t u te s

the p r incipal me ans fo r observ ing and under-

s tand ing i t . Engels d id no t ven tu re in to the

nooks and by-ways o f Manchester a lone. He

w as acco m p an ied o n h i s ex p ed i t io n s in to th e

inner recesses o f the c i ty by Mary Burns

cure

i n fo rm an t s ) an d i t w as sh e w h o in d u c t -

ed Engels in to certain working class circles

an d in to th e d o m es t i c l i ves o f t h e Man ch es t e r

p ro le tar ia t . Thus Engels learned how to read

a c i ty in th e co m p an y o r t h ro u g h th e m ed ia -

t ion o f an i l l i te ra te I r i sh fac to ry woman . He

learned to read the l i fe o f the c i tY wi th h is

49

eyes , ears , nose and fee t . He learned to read

i t wi th h is senses , the ch ie f in le ts o f mind in

th e p resen t ag e [1 8 ] .

Library Research

In add i t ion to h is personal impress ions

Engels d rew on l i terary au thor i t ies ( the works

of Peter Gaskel l , Jon Wade, George Richard ,

Richardson Por ter , Edward Baines , Andrew

Ure, the b ro thers Arch ibald and Wil l iam Pu l-

teney Al ison , Thomas Car ly le , and o thers

were consu l ted ) , and he a lso used o ff ic ia l

records , par l iamentary commiss ions , fac to ry

inspecto rs ' repor ts , and o ff ic ia l s ta t i s t ics .

Engels a lso read many newspapers includ ing

the Char t i s t

North Star,

w h ich p u b l i sh ed

workers ' le t ters and ar tic les . I am bur ied up

to m y n eck in E n g li sh n ew sp ap er s an d b o o k s ,

he wro te to Marx on November 19 , 1844 ,

f ro m w h ich I am co m p i l in g m y b o o k o n th e

co n d i t io n o f t h e E n g li sh p ro le t a r i a t . T h e

CWC thus aboun ds in fac ts , co l lec ted f rom

a var ie ty o f sources us ing a var ie ty o f research

st ra teg ies which have become the s tock in

t rade fo r modern scho lars .

Engels ' analy t ica l p rocedure in wri t ing the

CWC is that w hich Sweezy [19] has terme d

th e m e th o d o f su ccess iv e ap p ro x im a t io n .

Th is consis ts in moving f rom the abst rac t to

the more concre te in a s tep by s tep fash ion .

E n g el s ' m e t h o d , w as n o t h o w ev er , s im p ly

one o f abst rac t ion ; the log ical s tages in th is

su ccess iv e ap p ro x im a t io n co r resp o n d to th e

h is to r ica l s tages in the development o f cap i -

tal ism - the CWC is based o n a vast array of

facts gathered by a var ie ty o f methods .

THE GRE T TOWNS

In h i s s tu d y o f t h e d ev e lo p m e n t o f cap i-

ta l i sm, Engels beg ins wi th the Great Towns

and especia l ly Lon don , the cap i ta l o f Br i tain .

In a mem orab le message Engels recor ded his

f i r s t im p ress io n s o f L o n d o n f ro m A u tu m n o f

1 8 44 . H e sp eak s o f t h e en o rm i ty o f t h is

m e t ro p o l i s


8/26

50

where a man may wander for hours together without

reaching the beginning or the end, without meeting the

slightest hint which could lead to the inference that

there is open country within reach, is a strange thing.

This colossal centrali zation, this heaping together of two

and a half millions of human beings, at one point, has

multiplied the power of this two and a half millions a

hundred fold; has raised London to the commercial

capital of the world, created the giant docks and assem-

bled the thousand vessels that continually cover the

Thames ... all this is so vast, so impressive, that a man

cannot collect himself, but is lost in the marvel of Eng-

land s greatness before he sets forth upon the English

soil (p. 56).

It was not long before Engels understood

the price the Londoners had to pay for living

in such a dense metropolis. In one of the great

passages on the meaning of size, density, and

heterogeneity which for Wirth summed up

what he called urbanism as a way of life,

Engels drew important theoretical conclu-

sions. The passage is so significant that it

deserves quoting at some length.

After roaming the streets of the capital a day or two,

making headway with difficulty through the human tur-

moil and the endless lines of vehicles, after visiting the

slums of the met ropol is, one realises for the first time th at

these Londoners have been forced to sacrifice the best

qualities of their human nature, to bring to pass all the

marvels of civilisation which crowd their city; that a

hundred powers which slumbered within them have re-

mained inactive, have been suppressed so that a few might

be developed more fully and multiply through union with

those of others. The very turmoil of the streets has some-

thing repulsive, something against which human nature

rebels. The hundred of thousands of all classes and ranks

crowding past each other, are they not all human beings

with the same qualities and powers, and with the same

interest in being happy? and have they not, in the end, to

seek happiness in the same way, by the same means? And

still they crowd by one another as though they had

nothing in common, nothing to do with one another, and

their only agreement is the tacit one, that each keep to

his own side of the pavement, so as not to delay the

opposing streams of the crowd, while it occurs to no

man to honour another with so much as a glance. The

brutal indifference, the unfeeling isolation of each in his

private interest becomes the more repellent and offensive,

the more these individuals are crowded together, within

a limited space. And, however mu h one may be aware

that this isolation of th e individual, this narrow self-seek-

ing is the fundamental principle of our society every-

where, it is nowhere so shamelessly bare-faced, so self-

conscious as just here in the crowding of the great city.

The dissolution of mankind into nomads, of which each

one has a separate principle and a separate purpose, the

world of atoms, is here carried out to its utmo st extreme.

Hence, it comes, too, that the social war, the war of each

against all, is here op enly declared ... [P] eople regard each

other only as useful objects; each exploits the o ther, and

the end of it all is, that the stronger treads the weaker

under fo ot, and that the powerful few, the capitalists,

seize everything for themselves, while to the weak many,

the po or, scarcely a bare existence remains.

What is true of London, is true of Manchester, Birming-

ham, Leeds, is true of all great towns. Everywhere barbar-

ous indifference, hard egotism on one hand, and nameless

misery on the other, everywhere social warfare, every

man s house in a state of siege, everywhere reciprocal

plundering under the protection of the law, and all so

shameless, so openly avowed that one shrinks before the

concernings of our social state as they manifest them-

selves here undisguised, and can only wonder that the

whole crazy fabric still hangs together (pp. 57-5 8) [20].

This passage reveals Engels' great insight

into the impact of the capitalist industrial city

on the life of its occupants. His analytic de-

scriptive thrust locates urban alienation in the

historical evolution of the capitalist mode of

production - a society that is dominated by

the production of commodities and thus

stifles the fulfillment of human potentialities

for those from whom capitalists extract sur-

plus value. In such a society, respect for the

individual and human dignity cannot be

implemented, it only remains in the realm of

ideas and philosophic pronouncements about

hu ma n dignity and the sanctity of life.

This passage, I believe, was also the first

expression of what has since become a dom-

inant experience of the city. Blake saw a

commo n condition of weakness and woe.

Wordsworth saw strangeness, a loss of connec-

tion, not at first social but in perceptual

ways, a failure of identity in the crowd of

others which worked back to a loss of iden-

tity in the self, and then, in these ways, a loss

of society itself, its overcrowding and replace-

men t by a procession of images: the dance

of colours, lights and forms ... face after face

and there are no other laws [21].


9/26

George S imm el , in h is essay The Metro -

p o li s an d Men ta l L i f e , u n d er to o k to an a ly ze

an d ex p la in th e ch a rac te r i s ti c m e n ta l a t t i t u d e

o f m o d em c i ty d w e l le r s t o w ard s o n e an o th e r .

F o r S i m m e l t h e a t t i t u d e o f t h e m e t r o p o l i t a n

to w ard o th e r s t en d s to b e o n e o f r e se rve an d

formal i ty . The inner aspect o f th is reserve i s

no t on ly ind i f ference bu t a s l igh t avers ion o r

a t leas t mutual s t rangeness and repu ls iveness

[2 2 ] .

The ondon

Slums

What k ind o f l iv ing quar ters does cap i ta l

p rov ide fo r those i t exp lo i t s? Hav ing d iscussed

th e m ass an o n y m i ty o f L o n d o n , E n g e l s p ro -

ceed s to m ak e a m o re d e ta i led ex am in a t io n

of the c ond i t io ns in which the socia l war creat -

ed by cap i ta l i sm has p laced the p roper ty less

c lass . The p ic tu re Engels pain ts i s one o f in-

d i f ference and u t te r d isregard o f the welfare

of the p ro le tar ia t by the bourgeo is ie . He

regarded the p l igh t o f the p ro le tar ia t as a law-

g o v ern ed r e su lt o f t h e d o m in a t io n o f p r iva t e

proper ty and cap i ta l .

Since capi ta l , the d irec t o r ind irec t contro l o f the means

of subs is tence and produc t ion , is the weapon with which

the social warfare is carr ied on, it is clear that all the dis-

advantages of such a s ta te mus t f a l l upon th e poor . For

h im n o man has the s l igh tes t concern . Cas t in to the whir l -

pool , he mus t s t ruggle through as wel l as he can . I f he is

so happ y as to f ind work , i . e ., f f the bourgeois ie does h im

the favor to enr ich i tse lf by means of h im, wages await

h im wh ich scarce ly suf f ice to keep bod y and soul to -

ge ther ; i f he can ge t no work he ma y s tea l, i f he is no t

afraid of the police, or s tarve, in which case the police will

take ca re tha t he does so in a qu ie t an inof fensive manne r

(p. 58).

Engels th en descr ibes the Eng l ish s lums in a

genera l way , such as those o f the most b i t ter

p o v er ty th a t a r e to b e fo u n d n ea rb y to th e

sp len d id m an s io n s o f t h e w ea l th y an d w i th -

in th e m o s t r e sp ec tab le d i s tr i c ts o f t o w n .

A b o u t th e co n d i t io n o f h u m an ex i s t ence in

these s lums he c i tes f rom h is substan t ia l co l -

l ec t io n o f r ep o r ts , d o cu m en t s and n ew sp ap er

cl ipp ings which p rov ided shock ir rg s ta t i s t ics

51

ab o u t r en t an d d en s it i e s i n c lu d in g q u o tes

f ro m co ro n er s ' i n q u es t s o n p e r so n s w h o h ad

d ied o f s tarvat ion and in c i rcumstan ces o f

u t t e r d es t i t u t io n . H e a lso h as so m eth in g to

say abou t the homeless . He had v is i ted a

n u m b er o f i n fam o u s ch eap lo d gin g h o u ses,

and wri tes a hear t rend ing paragraph abou t

wha t he saw. Then th ere were the l i te ra l ly

u n h o u s e d a n d u n a c c o m m o d a t e d , t h o s e w h o

slep t in passages and arcades o r who found

sh e l t e r i n p a rk s o r o n th e em b an k m en t [2 3 ] .

Urban s lums were no t s imply an aberra t ion ,

they were the physical express ion o f the c lass

s t ructu re o f the c i t ies in the era o f indust r ia l

cap i ta l i sm:

Every grea t c i ty has one or more s lums , where the work-

ing-c lass is c rowded toge ther . True , pover ty of ten dwells

in h idden a l leys c lose to the pa laces of the r ich ; bu t , in

general , a separa te te r r i to ry has been ass igned to i t , where ,

removed f rom the s igh t of the happie r c lasses , i t may

struggle along as it can. These slums are pretty equally

ar ranged in a l l the grea t towns of England , the wors t

houses in the wors t quar te r s of the towns ; usua l ly one or

two-stor ies cottages in long rows, perhaps with cellars

used as dwellings, almost always ir regular ly built. These

houses of th ree or four rooms and k i tche n form, through-

out E ngland some par ts of Londo n excepted , the genera l

dwellings of the working-class. The streets are generally

unpaved , rough, d ir ty , f i l led with vege table and an im al

re fuse , with out sewers or gu t te r s , bu t suppl ied with foul ,

s tagnant pools ins tead . Moreover , vent i la t ion is impede d

b y th e b a d , c o n f u s e d me th o d o f b u i ld in g o f th e wh o le

quar te r , and man y h um an be ings here l ive c rowded in to

small space , the a tmosph ere tha t p reva ils in these work-

ing-men s quar te r s ma y readi ly be imagined . F ur ther ,

the s t r ee ts se rve as dry ing grounds in f ine wea ther ; l ines

are s t r e tched across f rom house to house , and hung with

wet c lo th ing (p . 59) [2 4] .

anchester

All the above is p re l iminary to a d iscuss ion

in deta i l o f Manchester , the c lassic g rou nd

on which Eng l ish indust ry has wrough t i t s

m as te rp iece . Wh a t so r t o f m as te rp iece w as

Manchester? In the descr ip t ion and analyses

of the workers ' l iving cond i t ions Engels makes

h i s sem in a l co n t r ib u t io n to th e so c io lo g y o f

th e u rb an co n d i t io n - t h e im p ac t o f cap it a li s t

indust r ia l iza t ion and u rba n izat ion which in

ma ny respects r ings t rue toda y as i t d id whe n

i t was wri t ten .


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52

Every th ing which here a roused hor ror and ind igna t ion is

of r ecent o r ig in , be longs to the indus tr ia l epoch . The

couple of hundred of houses , which be long to o ld Man-

ches te r , have long s ince been abandoned by the ir o r ig-

ina l inhabi tan ts ; the indus tr ia l epoch a lone has c rammed

in to them the swarms of workers which they now she l te r ;

the indus tr ia l epoch a lone has bu i l t up every spot be tween

the ir o ld houses to win a new covering for the masses

whom i t has conju red h i ther f rom the agr icu l ture d is t r ic ts

and f rom I re land; the indus tr ia l epoch a lone enabled the

owners of these ca t t lesheds to r en t them for h igh pr ices

to human be ings , to p lunder the pover ty of the workers ,

to undermine the hea l th of thousands , in order tha t they

alone

the owners , may grow r ich . In the indus tr ia l epoch

a lone i t has become poss ib le tha t the worker sca rce ly

f reed f rom feuda l se rv i tude could be used as mere mate -

r ia l , a mere cha t t le ; tha t he mus t le t h imse lf be c rowded

in to a dwell ing too bad for every o ther , which he for h is

hard-earned wages buys the r igh t to le t go u t te r ly to ru in

(p. 87).

Capitalism pit chf ork ed the new proletar-

iat, often composed of immigrants from pre-

industrial backgrounds, into a social hell in

which they were ground down, despised,

underpaid (if they had a job) or starved, left

to rot in the slums [25]. The description of

this offers insight into the class structure of

the city that has endured and still character-

izes modem urban areas. Manchester con-

tained then about four hundred thousand

inhabitants. The town itself was peculiarly

built so that a person may live in it for years,

and go in and out daily without coming into

contact with working-people's quarters or

even with worker s, tha t is, so long as he

confines himself to his business or to pleasure

walks:

This a r ises ch ie f ly f rom the fac t , tha t by unconsc ious

tac i t agreement , a s wel l a s with ou tspoken consc ious

de te rmina t ion , the work ing-people s quar te r s a re sharp ly

separa ted f rom the sec t ions of the c i ty r ese rved for the

middie-class; or , if this does not succeed, they are con-

cea led with the c loak of ch ar i ty (p . 78) .

The description of the spatial structure of

Manchester by Engels anticipated by some

eighty years what has come to be known as

the concentric zone theory of the city, as

formulated by Park and Burgess.

Manches te r conta ins , a s i ts hear t , a r a ther ex tended com-

merc ia l d is t r ic t , pe rhaps ha lf a mile long and about as

broad , and cons is t ing a lmos t wholly of o f f ices and ware-

houses . Near ly the whole d is t r ic t is abandoned by dwell-

e r s, and is lone ly and deser ted a t n igh t ; on ly watchm en

and pol icemen t r averse i ts na r row lanes with the ir da rk

lan te rns . This d is t r ic t is cu t th rough by ce r ta in main

thoroughfares upon which the vas t t r a f f ic concentra tes ,

and in which th e ground leve l is lined with br i l l ian t shops .

In these s t r eets the upper f loors a re occupied , he re and

there , is a good dea l o f l i f e upon them unt i l la te a t n igh t .

With the except ion of th is comm erc ia l d is t r ic t , a l l Man-

ches te r p roper , a l l Sa lford and Hulme, a g rea t pa r t o f

P e n d le to n a n d Ch o r l to n , two - th k d s o f Ar d wic k , a n d

s ing le s t r e tches of Chee tham Hil l and Broughton a re a l l

unm ixed work ing-people s quar te r s , s t r e tch ing l ike a

g ird le , averag ing a mile and a ha lf in bread th , a round

the commerc ia l d is t r ic t . Outs ide , beyon d th is gkdle , the

upper and middle bourgeois ie l ive in r egula r ly la id ou t

s t r ee ts in the v ic in i ty of the work ing quar te r s , e specia l ly

in Chor l ton and lower ly ing por t ions of Chee tham Hil l ;

the upper bourgeoisie in r emoter v i l las with gardens in

Chor l ton and Ardwick , o r on the breezy he ights o f Chee t-

ham Hil l , Broughton , and Pendle ton , in f r ee , wholesome

country a ir , in f ine , comfor tab le homes , passed once

every ha lf o r quar te r hou r by omnib us go ing in to to c i ty .

And the f ines t pa r t o f the a r rangement is th is , tha t the

members of th is money a r is tocracy can take the shor tes t

road th rough the m iddle of a l l the labour ing d ist r ic ts to

the ir p laces of bus iness , witho ut ever seeing tha t they a re

in the mids t o f the gr imy misery tha t lu rks to the r igh t

and the le f t. For the thoroughfares lead ing f rom the ex-

change in a l l d irec t ions ou t o f the c i ty a re l ined , on bo th

s ides , with an a lmos t unbr oken se ries of shops , and a re so

kept in the hands of the middle and lower bourgeois ie ,

which, out of self- interest, cares for a decent and cleanly

exte rna l appearance and can ca re for i t. True , these shops

boar some re la t ion to the d is t r ic t which l ie beh ind them,

and a re more e legant in the commerc ia l and res ident ia l

quar te r s tha n w hen t hey h ide gr imy working-m en s dwel-

l ings ; bu t they suf f ice to concea l f rom the eyes of the

wea l thy men and women of s t rong s tomaches and weak

nerves the misery and gr ime which form the complement

of the ir wea l th (p . 79) .

Engels then proceeds to a concrete demon-

stration and conducts the reader along a

number of the main streets, showing how the

changes in the character of the buildings that

front the streets indicates what is to be found

behind them. He is in fact charting one series

of connected and stratified variables within

the social topography of the cit y [26].

Engels concludes this spatial analysis of Man-


11/26

chester wi th the observ at ion (p . 110) that :

[ A ] n y o n e w h o k n o w s M a n c h e s t e r c a n i n f e r t h e a d j o in i n g

d i s t r ic t f r o m t h e a p p e a r a n c e o f t h e th o r o u g h f a r e b u t

one i s se ldom in a pos i t ion to ca tch f rom the s t ree t a

g l impse o f the rea l l abour ing d i s t r i c t s . I know very wel l

tha t th i s hypocr i t i ca l p lan is mor e o r l e ss com mo n to a l l

g rea t c i t i e s; I know too tha t the re ta i l dea le r s a re fo rc ed

b y t h e n a t u r e o f t h e ir b u s i n e s s t o t a k e p o s s e s s i o n o f t h e

g r e a t h i g h w a y s ; I k n o w t h a t t h e r e a r e m o r e g o o d b u il d -

i n gs t h a n b a d o n e s u p o n s u c h s t re e t s e v e r y w h e r e a n d t h a t

the va lue o f l and i s g rea te r near the m th an in rem ote d i s -

t r i c t s ; bu t a t the same t ime I have never seen so sys tem-

a t ic a shu t t ing ou t o f the work ing-c lass f rom th e thor -

o u g h f a r e s s o t e n d e r a c o n c e a l m e n t o f e v e r y t h in g w h i c h

m i g h t a f f r o n t t h e e y e s a n d t h e n e r v e s o f t h e b ou r g e o i si e

as in Manches te r .

Such are the physical ar rangem ents o f Man-

chester. The genera l laws that def ine the

h i s to ry o f u rb an d ev e lo p m en t an d th e i r l i nk s

to th e d y n am ics o f capi t a li s t w ea l th accu m u -

la t ion and d is t r ibu t ion are bas ic to the sc ience

of the c i ty . Dav id Harvey [27] po in ts ou t

that th is approach fo l lowed by Engels in 1844

was and s t il l is far more consis te n t wi th the

hard economic and socia l rea l i t ies than i s the

cu l tu ra l i s t ap p ro ach ad o p te d b y u rb an o lo g i s ts

w h o w r i t e o n th e g h e t to an d u rb an p o v er ty .

In fac t wi th cer ta in obv ious modif ic a t ions ,

Engels ' descr ip t ion cou ld eas i ly be made to

f i t t h e co n te m p o ra ry A m er ican c i ty [2 8 ] .

In Man ch es t e r , l i k e in m o d em b o u rg eo i s

c i t ies , the s lum, pover ty and o ther u rban d is-

o rd e rs w ere a p e rm an e n t f ea tu re o f t h i s c ity ,

em bed ded in i t s class re la t ions . The separa t ion

o f th e r i ch an d th e p o o r h ad b een b u i l t i n to

the very spat ia l s t ructu re o f the c i ty , by insur-

ing that d i f feren t ia l access to scarce resources

p e rp e tu a ted th e in eq u a l i t i e s t h a t fo rm ed

cap i ta l i sm. The imperat ives o f cap i ta l i s t log ic

l an d sp ecu la t io n , i n co m e co n cen t ra t io n ,

p o l it i ca l p o w e r - co m b in e to ex c lu d e th e

poo r and cer ta in sect ions o f the work ing class

f ro m th e b en e f i t s o f cap it a l is t eco n o m ic

growth. Worse st i l l , the working-class distr ict

i s a lways l iab le fo r demol i t ion because o f

bu i l t - in obso lescence o f i t s housing . The

con tracto rs , usual ly carpen ters anal bu i lders ,

53

or manufactu rers , spend l i t t le o r no th ing in

repai rs pa r t ly to avo id d imin ish ing thei r ren t

receip ts , and par t ly in v iew of the approach-

in g su r ren d er o f t h e im p ro v em en t to th e l an d

o w n ers ; w h i le in co n seq u en ce o f co m m erc ia l

cr ises and loss o f work that fo l lows them,

w h o le s t r ee t s o f t en s t an d em p ty , t h e co t t ag es

fa l l ing rap id ly in to ru in and un inhab i tab le-

ness (p . 92).

S ince Engels wro te the CWC, the c i ty has

en o rm o u s ly ex p an d ed as an o rg an iza t io n o f

p ro d u c t io n an d a co n cen t r a t ed cen te r o f

power and weal th , i t has a lso deter io ra ted as

a p l ace in w h ich to co n d u c t o th e r h u m a n an d

civilized activit ies. As the wea lthier popula -

t ion have f led the cen ter , th ey have leap-

frogged over the vast working-class and left

them there massed , as i t were , abou t that

a l ternat ively dense and ho l low core , in an

im m en se u n b ro k en b e l t i n w h ich th ey w o rk

and l ive [29] . Othe r spat ia l aspects o f u rban

grow th deal t wi th by Engels conce rn the

p h y sica l sep a ra t io n b e tw een th e p l ace o f w o rk

and the p lace o f res idence.

THE SOCI L L IFE OF THE WORKING CL SS

Wh at k in d o f ex is t en ce d oes th e w o rk in g

class lead? Th at i s, wh at are the con d i t ions o f

l i fe and ex is tence l ike fo r the work ing c lass

in genera l and fo r workers in par t icu lar?

Engels g ives a shock ing p ic tu re o f the p l igh t

o f the Eng l ish workers . L i fe in the u rban

s lum s fo r t h e lo w p a id an d u n em p lo y ed w as

character ized by demoral iza t ion and a l iena-

t io n , b y th e m o s t p ro fo u n d soc ial and p er -

sonal d is t ress . I t app rox i ma ted the Hobbesian

war o f each agains t a l l.

Engels beg ins by t rac ing the resu l ts o f com-

pet i t ion o f s ing le workers wi th one ano ther .

C o m p e t i t i o n i s t h e co m p le t e s t ex p ress io n o f

the bat t le o f a l l which ru les modem civ i l

society . Th is batt le, a batt le for l ife, for exis-

tence , fo r every th ing , in case o f need a bat t le

fo r l i fe and death , i s fough t no t between the

d i f feren t c lasses o f socie ty on ly , bu t a lso be-

twee n the ind iv idual me mb ers o f these c lasses .


12/26

54

Each is in the way of the other, and each

seeks to crowd ou t all who are in his way, and

to put himself in their place (p. 110).

The mode of conflict Engels is describing

is spawned in the interstices of the jungle

capitalist; its values and relations are reflected

in human behavior.

In the s t rugg le fo r ex i s tence ; the p ro le ta r ia t i s he lp less ;

l e f t to h imse l f , he cann ot l ive a sing le day . The bou r -

g e o i si e h a s g a i n e d a m o n o p o l y o f a l l m e a n s o f e x i s t e n c e . . . ;

w h a t t h e p r o l e t a r i a t n e e d s h e c a n o b t a i n o n l y f r o m t h i s

bourgeo is ie , wh ich can decree h i s l i f e o r dea th . I f o f fe r s

h i m t h e m e a n s o f l i v in g , b u t o n l y f o r an " e q u i v a l e n t " f o r

h i s work . I t even le t s h im have the appearance o f ac ting

f rom a f ree cho ice , o f making a con t rac t wi th f ree , un-

c o n s t r a i n e d c o n s e n t , a s a r e s p o n s ib l e a ge n t w h o h a s

a t ta ine d h i s major i ty (p . 110) .

Engels spends many pages setting down in

detail what can only be called conditions of

social hell under which the workers and the

poor lived. In the great towns disease of every

kind flourished. Lung disease and various

grades of fever were common. He also gives a

summary of diseases connected both directly

and in a secondary way with diet deficiency,

such as scrofula, rickets and a variety of ali-

mentary troubles [30].

Engels was the first to discuss what urban

anthropologists call the Culture of Poverty -

a group of circumstances and kinds of be-

havior patterns which when acting in concert

create a viscious circle for the poor, the unem-

ployed and the unemployable. First there was

unemployment which produced helplessness

and drunkeness; which as symptoms of this

state, are an effort on the part of the poor

to gain temporary release from their life, and

a furt her auxiliary cause in its worsening. The

cause of poverty, contrary to liberal assump-

tions, is created by capitalism and should not

be explained by the weakness and shiftless-

ness of individuals. Capitalism as a mode of

production creates a class structure of the

employed and the unemployable. The latter

class is put in a situation where it cannot help

but acquire and develop certain attitudes.

Then these acquired attitudes are taken to be

their nature and to determine their roles in

society. So dirty, tem pora ry and seasonal jobs

are assigned to this class and when their serv-

ices are no longer needed, they are then

blamed for being shiftless and not deserving.

What is called culture of poverty, is thus a

life-style that is more the result of poverty

than its cause.

For instance, on top of everything else the

working class areas suffered from a complete

absence of almost all facilities for sociability

and recreat ion. As Engels puts it;

The fa i l ing o f the w orkers in genera l may be t raced to an

u n b r i d l e d t h i r s t f o r p l e a s u re , t o w a n t o f p r o v i d e n c e , a n d

of f l ex ib i l i ty in f i t t ing in to the soc ia l o rder , to the genera l

i n a b i l i t y t o s a c r i f i c e t h e p l e a s u r e o f t h e m o m e n t t o a

rem ote advan tage . But i s tha t to be won dere d a t? When a

c lass can purchase fe w and on ly the mos t sensua l p leas -

ures by weary ing to i l , mus t i t no t g ive i t se l f over b l ind ly

and madly to those p leasures? A c lass abou t whose educa-

t ion no one t roub les h imse l f , which i s a p layba l l to a

thou sand chances , knows no secur i ty in l i f e - wha t in -

cen t ives has such a c lass to p rov iden ce , to " respec tab i l -

i t y , " t o s a c ri f ic e t h e p l e a su r e o f t h e m o m e n t f o r a re -

m o t e r e n j o y m e n t , m o s t u n c e r t a i n p r e c i s el y b y r e a s o n o f

t h e p e r p e t u a l l y v a r y i n g , s h i f ti n g c o n d i t i o n s u n d e r w h i c h

the p ro le ta r ia t l ives? A c lass which bears a l l the d i sad-

van tages o f the soc ial o rder w i thou t en joy ing i t s ad-

van tages , one to which the soc ia l sys tem appears in pure ly

hos t i l e aspec t s - who can d ema nd tha t such a c lass

respec t th i s soc ia l o rder? Ver i ly tha t i s a sk ing much But

t h e w o r k i n g m a n c a n n o t e s c a p e t h e p r e s e n t a r r a n g e m e n t

of soc ie ty so long as i t ex i s t s , and when the ind iv idua l

worker res i s t s i t , the g rea tes t in ju ry fa l ls upo n h imse l f

(p. 162).

In the English cities there was thus a strik-

ing contrast be tween the extraordinary af-

fluence of the middle classes and the poverty

of the unemployed and unemployable; in the

dispossessed and vagrants, the old, the sick

and the disabled, who, because they were

unable to work in the towns crea ted by the

capitalist, were seen merely as negative and

unwanted burdens. In analyzing the position

of the Irish, Engels made a point basic to the

understanding of the poor in cities under

capitalism - the need o f the capitalist for a

reserve army of labor. The rapid expansion


13/26

of English industry could not have taken

place if England had not possessed in the

numerous and impoverished population of

Ireland a reserve at command ... There are in

London 20,000; in Manchester 40,000; in

Liverpool 34,000 poor Irish people . (p. 124)

The surplus population serves definite func-

tions under capitalism: it can be drawn upon

during the periodic cycles of prosperity and

let go during the inevitable downturn. The

slums are the physical expression that the

reserve army is a permanently essential part

of capitalism. The reserve army was composed

partly of proletarians, partly of potential

proletarians - countr ymen, Irish immigrants,

people from the economically dynamic areas

and less dynamic occupa tions [31 ].

The important institutional casuality of

urban capitalist development was to be none

other than tile working-class family. The

demand capitalism made on the various mem-

bers of the working-class family made family

life almost impossible for the workers. As

Engels (p. 162) put it

In a comfor t less , f i l thy house , ha rd ly good enough for

mere n igh t ly she l te r, i l l - furn ished , o f ten ne i t her r a in- tigh t

nor w arm, a fou l a tm osphere f i l l ing rooms overc rowded

with h um an be ings , no dom es t ic com for t is poss ible . The

husband works the whole day th rough , perhaps the wife

a lso and the e lder ch i ldren , a l l in d if fe ren t p laces ; they

meet n igh t and morning only , a l l under perpe tua l tempta-

t ion to dr ink ; wha t f amily l i f e is poss ib le under such

condit ions? Yet the work ing-man cannot escape the

family , mus t l ive in the family , and the consequence is

a perpe tua l success ion of f amily t roubles , domes t ic quar -

re ls , mos t demora l is ing for paren ts and ch i ldren a l ike .

Neglec t o f a l l domes t ic du t ies , neg lec t o f the ch i ldren ,

especially, is only too vigorously fostered by the existing

ins t i tu t ions of soc ie ty . And ch i ldren growing up in th is

savage way, amidst these demoralis ing inf luences, are ex-

pec ted to tu rn ou t goody-goody and mora l in the end

Ver i ly the requirem ents a re na ive , which the se lf -sa t is f ied

bourgeois makes upon the w ork ing-man

On top of all these problems, the working-

man, who was lucky enough to have a job was

no bette r off - the work he did was not of a

self-fulfilling kind. It was work imposed on

the working class as a necessity. Engels states

55

that the machine-tending work of a spinning

operative was guaranteed, if nothing else, to

break the spirit. It prevented the worker from

occupying his mind with anything else.

The superv is ion of machinery , the jo in ing of b roken

threads , is no ac t iv i ty which c la ims the opera t ive ' s th ink-

ing , ye t i t i s o f a sor t which prevents h im f rom occupying

his mind w ith o t her th ings . .. th is work a f fords the muscles

no oppor tun i ty for phys ica l ac t iv i ty . Thus i t is , p roper ly

speaking , no t work , bu t ted ium, the mos t deadening ,

wear ing process conce ivable . The opera t ive is condemne d

to le t h is phys ica l and menta l powers decay in th is u t te r

monotony , i t i s h is miss ion to be bored every day and a l l

day long f rom h is e igh th year . Moreover, he mus t n o t take

a moment ' s r es t ; the engine moves increas ing ly , the

whee ls , the s t r aps , the sp ind les hum and ra t t le in h is ea r s

with out a pause , and i f he t r ies to sna tch one ins tan t ,

the re is the over looker a t h is back with the bo ok o f fines .

This condemnation to be burned a l ive in the mil l , to g ive

cons tan t a t ten t ion to the t i r e less machine is f e l t a s the

keenes t to r ture by th e opera t ives , and i ts ac t ion upon

mind and body is in the long run s tun t ing in the h ighes t

degree (p. 211) .

Since Engels wrote CWC, factory work has

become worse. It has been reduced to a series

of operations that are even more deadening to

the senses. The machine tending in the textile

mills, copy typist work, key-punch operators

and computer programmers, bank clerks -

the watchers and tenders of new electronic

technology - all con front a working life

whose quality is to say the least unappetizing

[32]. Bookchin makes the point that the aim

of capital is to reduce human labor into an

aggregate of muscular and mental energy and

to make it lose its identit y as an expression of

human powers [33].

Though the development of capitalist

science and technology provides the material

prerequisites for the emancipation of labor,

by reducing necessary labor time and im-

mensely increasing productivity, the actual

consequences are not liberating but enslaving.

The individual worke r is no longer identifiably

productive; established skills are eroded and

displaced; the worker is subordinated to the

machine; wages are depressed; both the in-

tensity and the length of the working day are


14/26

56

increased. Marx summed up the consequences

of fact ory work as follows:

Factory work exhausts the nervous system to the utter-

most; at the same time, it does away with the many-sided

play o f the muscles, and confiscates every atom of free-

dom, both in bodily and in intellectual activity. Even the

lightening of the labour becomes an instrument of tor-

ture, since the machine does not free the worker from the

work, but rather deprives the work itself of all conten t.

. Every kind of capitalist production, in so far as it is not

only a labour process but also capital s process of valori-

zation, has this in common, but it is not the worker who

employs the conditions of his work, but rather the

reverse, the conditions o f work employ the worker. How-

ever, it is only with the coming of machinery that this

inversion first acquires a technical and palpable reality.

Owing to its conversion into an automaton, the instrumen t

of labour confronts the worker during the labour process

in the shape of capital, dead labour, which dominates and

soaks up living labour-power. The separation of the intel-

lectual faculties of the production process from manual

labour, and the transformation of those faculties into

powers exercised by capital over labour, is, as we have

already shown, finally completed by large-scale industry

erected on the foundatio n of machinery. The special skill

of each individual machine-operator, who has now been

deprived of all significance, vanishes as an infinitesimal

quantity in the face of the science, the gigantic natural

forces, and the mass of social labour embodied in the sys-

tem of machinery, which, together with those three

forces, constitutes the power of the master [34].

What does this tell us? That the process

tha t has p roduced vast material wealth is

simultaneously reproduced as absolute aliena-

tion, that it has produced this wealth on the

backs of workers who had been reduced to

what C. Wright Mills called cheerful robots .

In the language of the factory, workers are

hand s and operatives ; and individuality

in work is reduced to a numerical expression.

The fragmentation of the work process is to

ensure that capital through its hired managers

had the greatest possible degree of control

over the living labor it emp loys [35] .

In the bourgeois city the very bases of

human association have been distorted and

reduced into harsh comm odity relations;

everyone becomes an ene my of everyone else.

In this country, social war is under full headway, every

one stands for himself, and fights for himself against all

comers, and whether or not he shall injure all the others

who are his declared foes, depends upon a cynical calcula-

tion as to what is more advantageous for himself. It no

longer occurs to any one to come to a peaceful under-

standing with his fell ow-man; all differences are settl ed by

threats, violence, or in a court of law. In short, everyone

sees in his neighbor an enemy to be got out of the way,

or, at best, a tool to be used for his own advantage. And

this war grows from year to year, as the criminal table

shows, more violent, passionate, irreconcilable. The ene-

mies are dividing gradually into two great camps - the

bourgeoisie on the one hand, the workers on the other.

This war of each against all, of the bourgeoisie against the

proletariat, need cause us no surprise, for it is only the

logical sequel of the principle involved in free competi-

tion (pp. 165-166).

Engels also discussed such currently perti-

nent problems of capitalism as depression and

trade cycles, the question of the reserve

army of labor, the theoretical problems of

surplus labor, and the actual existence of sur-

plus laborers, largely in the form of an im-

mense pool of casual laborers in the cities and

beneath them of an almost as large group of

unemployed and unemployable members of

the proletariat [ 36].

THE CL SS STRUGGLE

Engels understood the progressive role of

cities in history as centers of economic-cul-

tural development and incubators of the

modern revolutionary working class. In the

industrial towns, the working men and

women were faced with many difficult prob-

lems. Millions of hitherto independent pro-

ducers had been pitc hfor ked from the

natural econo my and rendered destitute.

Those who fo und work consumed today what

they made yesterday. The men and women

who by their toil created the greatness of Eng-

land were living on the margins of poverty;

receiving less and less of the surplus value

they produced. The working class soon real-

ized that their situation was not temporary:

they came to understand that they were an

integral and permanent part of the property-


15/26

less urban population. It dawned on them

that their children would be born to toil,

would have no other prospect than remaining

toilers all their lives. To defend themselves

the workers formed themselves into trade

unions. The industrial urban milieu forced

them to learn the meaning of their situation

and by concentrating them in the urban

space, made them learn the power of collec-

tive action.

The grea t c i t ies a re the b ir thp laces of labour movements ;

in them the workers f i r s t began to r e f lec t upon the ir

own condi t ion , and to s t ruggle aga ins t i t ; in them the

oppos i t ion be tween pro le ta r ia t and bourgeois ie f i r s t made

i tse lf manifes t ; f rom them proceeded the Trade Unions ,

Char t ism, and Soc ia l ism. The grea t c i t ies have t r ans -

formed the d isease of the soc ial body, w hich appears in

chronic form in the country , in to an acute one , and so

made manifes t i ts r eal na ture and the means of cur ing i t .

Without the grea t c i t ies and the ir forc ing inf luence upon

popula t ion in te l l igence , the working-c lass would be fa r

less advanced than it is . Moreover , they have destroyed

the las t r emnant of pa tr ia rcha l r e la t ion be tween working-

men and employers , a r esu l t to which manufac ture on a

la rge sca le has contr ibu ted by mult ip ly ing the employees

depend ent upon a sing le employer p . 153) .

A great part of the CWC is devoted to the

working-class movement, its forms and meth-

ods of struggle. It is thus no accident that

some of the most profound and enduring in-

sights about working consciousness derived

from the CWC. For Engels the working class

movement was a necessary expression of the

antagonistic contra dictions of the main classes

of capitalist society.

Working-class consciousness and struggle

under capitalism has gone through many

phases. The earliest and crudest form of

struggle was that of crime and was induced by

want, distress or necessity. The working-man

lived in poverty and want, and saw that others

were bette r of f than he. It was not clear to

his mind why he, who did more fo r society

than the rich idler, should be the one to suffer

under these conditions. Want conquered his

inherited respect for the sacredness of proper-

ty, and he stole ... crime increased with the

extension of manufactur e, ... the yearly num-

57

ber of arrests bore a constant relation to the

number of bales of cotton annually consum-

ed (p. 248).

Soon the workers realized that crime did

not help their cause. That is to say, the struc-

ture of crime reproduces the structure of the

existing social injustice as much as it pro-

tested against them.

The c r imina l could pro t es t aga ins t the ex is t ing order of

soc ie ty only s imply , as one ind iv idua l ; the who le might of

soc ie ty was broug ht to bear upon each c rimina l , and

crushed h im with i ts immense super ior i ty . Bes ides , the f t

was the mos t pr imit ive form of pro tes t , and for th is

reason , i f for no o ther , i t never became the univer sa l

express ion of the publ ic op in ion of the working-men,

however much they might approve of i t in s i lence . As a

c lass , they f i r s t manifes ted oppos i t ion to the bourgeois ie

wh e n th e y r e s is t e d th e in t r o d u c t io n o f ma c h in e r y a t th e

very beginning of the indus tr ia l pe r iod p . 249) .

The political significance of crime for

Engels showed a lack of political conscious-

ness on the part of the urban proletariat. The

next stage in the development of political

awareness among the newly proletarianized

workers was the revolt against the machinery

in the cause of which factories were demol-

ished. This form of opposition was too nar-

rowly focused and, like crime, self-defeating:

When the monetary end was attained, the

whole might of social power fell upon the un-

protected evil doers and punished them to its

heart's content, while the machinery was

introduced none the less (p. 259).

The third stage reached by the working

class was the political form of struggle. The

reform bill of 1824 opened the way for this

phase in working-class political development.

The reform bill gave the working class a right

previously restricted to the aristocracy and

the bourgeoisie, the right of free association.

The hitherto secret organizations of the

workers could now be organized openly. In

all branches of industry Trade Unions were

formed with the outspoken intention of

protecting the single working-men against the

tyranny and neglect of the bourgeoisie. The


16/26

58

objects were: to fix wages and to deal, en

masse as a power, with the employers; to

regulate the rate of wages according to the

profit of its latter, to raise it when opportun-

ity offered, and to keep it uniform in each

trade through out the cou ntr y (p. 250).

Although the proletarianization of the

peasants had been a universal negation, with

the growth of the labor movement the work-

ers began to discover their power and their

humanity as well. In the trade union move-

ment the working-men discovered a new state

of consciousness and the beginnings of a new

kind of solidarity. The great urban centers,

the house of modern industry, by concentrat-

ing furthe r both the increase of middle-class

wealth and power on the one hand and work-

ing-class poverty and helplessness on the other

was the main source of working-class move-

ment and class consciousness. That is, urban

development was a gigantic process of class

segregation, which put the new laboring poor

into great morasses of misery outside the

centers of government and business and the

newly specialized residential area of the bour-

geoisie. The almost universal European divi-

sion into a goo d west end and a po or

east end of large cities could not help but

produce this solidarity [ 37 ].

The labor mo vement of the first half of the

nineteenth century was not either in composi-

tion or in its ideology and program a strictly

proletar ian movement, i.e., one of indus-

trial and factory workers or even one con-

fined to wage earners. It was rath er a common

front of all forces and tendencies representing

the (mainly urban) laboring-poor [38]. Its

importance lay not in its effectiveness, but in

the lessons of solidarity and class conscious-

ness which it taught.

Engels examined in detail the life experi-

ences and struggles in specific production

processes and production relations to reveal

the forms of existence in these branches: the

spinners and weavers, workers in knitting and

embroidery, tailors and dressmakers, glass-

blowers, metal workers, miners, and farm

laborers. He shows the workers' tribulations

and struggles against impossible odds. The

misery had impelled the workers to grapple

with their condition. Engels found that the

workers in industry were more conscious of

their class interest than others. Under capi-

talism, the proletarians' human dignity is

expressed only in struggle against the existing

conditions. Hence the importance of trade

unions and economic strikes as instruments

for advancing the interests of the workers,

and as a means of uniting the workers and

generating militancy.

These strikes,

at first

skirmishes, sometimes resulted in

weighty struggles; they decide noth ing, it is true, bu t

true they are the strongest proof that the decisive battle

between bourgeoisie and proletariat is approaching. They

are the military school of the working-men in which they

prepare themselves for the great struggle which cannot be

avoided; they are the pronounci amentos of single branches

of industry that these too have joined the labour move-

ment ... and as a school of war, the unions are unexcelled

(p. 260).

Engels illustrated the political conscious-

ness of the miners by describing the coal

miners' efforts to form a trade union and to

organize a strike which they launched in

March 1844. The miners had collected a strike

fund large enough to assure each miners'

family of strike pay of half a crown a week

for several months. The miners nineteen-week

experience was a great triumph; workers uni ty

struck fear in the hearts of the bourgeoisie.

The great five mon ths battl e of the coal miners against

mine owners, a battle fought on the part of the

oppressed

with an endurance, courage, intelligence, and coolness

demands the highest admiration. What a degree of true

human venture, of enthusiasm and strength of character,

such a battle implies on the part of men who ... were

described as late as 1840, as being thoroughly brutal

and

wanting in moral sense (p. 204).

What gives these Unions and the strikes arising f rom them

their real importance is this, that they are the first at

tempt of the workers to abolish competition . They imply

the recognition of the fact that the supremacy of the

bourgeoisie, is based wholly upon the competit ion of the


17/26

w o r k e r s among themselves; i.e., upon their want of

cohesion. And precisely because the Unions direct them-

selves against the vital nerve of the present social order,

however one-sidedly, in however narrow a way, are they

so dangerous to this social order. The working-men can-

not attack the bourgeoisie, and with it the whole existing

o r e r of society, at any sorer point than this. If the com-

petition of the workers among themselves is destroyed, if

all determine not to be further exploited by the bour-

geoisie, the rule of property is at an end pp. 218 -219 ).

The industrial capitalist city by its very

nature creates a new consciousness among

workers and a will to resist the injustices of

capitalism. It functions as an organizing con-

tainer; the source of Blake's mind-forg'd

monacles. That is, it is a focus of all connec-

tions - social, political and economic. The

workers saw plenty of wealth around them,

and the law protecting its gross inequities.

They wanted enough to live on, and by fair

means or foul we will have it [39] .

For Engels the working-class movement

was an imperative and an expression of the

antagonism of capital. He saw the Chartist

movement as having the potential of becom-

ing a proletarian and a socialist movement.

Why? Because Chartism is the compact form

of the opposition to the bourgeoisie (p. 263).

Prior to that opposition always remained

isolated. It was single working men or sections

who fought a single bourgeois. If the fight

became general, this was scarcely by inten tion

of the working men or when it did happen

intentionally, Chartism was at the bottom of

it. But in Chartism it is the whole working-

class which arises against the bourgeoisie, and

attacks, first of all the political power, the

legislative rampart with which the bourgeoisie

has surrounded itself.

But in England of the 1840s, socialism was

still unc onnect ed to the working-class move-

ment and those who advocated socialism did

not advocate an implacable class struggle.

English Socialism arose with Owen, a manu-

facturer, and proceeds therefore with great

consideration toward the bourgeoisie and

great injustices toward the proletariat in its

methods, although it culminates in demanding

59

the abolition of the class antagonism between

bourgeoisie and proletariat. The socialists are

thoroughly tame and peacable, accept our

existing order, bad as it is, so far as to reject

all other methods but that of winning public

opinion (pp. 272- 273 ).

How was Chartism to overcome its limita-

tions? It had to be purified of its bourgeois

elements and merge with the working class.

This process had already begun and many

Chartist leaders had embraced socialism.

Capitalist development was producing prole-

tarian socialism, whose historical necessity

was determined by the antagonistic character

of capitalism and the advance of philosophical

and sociological thought. Through the study

of the objective conditions Engels was able to

demonstrate how the progress of capitalist

production induced the proletarians to unite

in a single powerful army which was increas-

ingly conscious of the fact that its interests

were incompatible with those of the capitalist.

The war of the poor against the rich now

carried on in detail and indir ectly will become

direct and universal. It is too late for peaceful

solution. The classes are divided more and

more sharply, the spirit of resistance pene-

trates the workers, the bitterness intensifies,

the guerilla skirmishes become concentrated

in more important battles, and soon a slight

impulse will suffice to set t he avalanche in

mo ti on (p. 335).

THE MIDDLE CL SSES

In analyzing the poverty of the working

class, Engels knew that he was dealing with a

society where poverty and affluence are in-

separably joined; where the production of

wealth takes place on condition of the social

or absolute impoverishment of the producers.

The poverty of the working class had thus

always to be compared with the affluence of

the middle classes. As Bentham put it:

In the highest stage of social prosperity, the great mass of

the citizens will most probably possess few other

engels: the condition of the working class in england in 1844 and the housing question (1872)...

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