Middle and Working Classes Flashcards
(16 cards)
1
Q
Class Formation - based on privilege and order.
A
- Rule of Law (equality in front of the law)
- End of feudalism for capitalism
- Commodification of labour and land.
- Freedom of trade - production, exchange of goods w/o barriers.
- Industrialisation: production under conditions of industrial capitalism with the expansion of the economy regarding secondary sector over primary sector.
- Changes in ownership of means of production.
- Status = corporate identity based on professional occupation, rights (or absence of), specific culture = becomes class due to socioeconomic changes.
2
Q
Change from status to Class
A
- Emergence of an ‘economic or market class’ based on similar economic conditions across different occupations - unlike each occupation being its own world and distinct rules etc.
- ‘Social class’: increasing class consciousness, linked to specific forms of class culture in everyday life.
- Political class: class consciousness transformed into political activity and political organisation (e.g parties).
3
Q
Notion and practice of class struggle
A
- Class interest determined by the relationship between (economic) base and (sociocultural) superstructure (Marx)
- Question of coherence - was there a homogeneity of classes and would they have the same class interests - risks false class consciousness.
- Changing gender roles - definitions of labour and privilege and the relationship across gender and class? was emancipation for both women and men?
- Suel = possible under old regime for well-placed women or guilds to have far greater power over non-privileged people than the so-called equality before the law, mostly for men introduced by revolutionaries.
4
Q
Class and the Revolution of 1848
A
- Assesses the impact of social structures on political events - crucial in the revolution:
+ Middle classes’ constitutional agenda and liberal ideas demanding greater role in politics and the
+ Working classes’ demands in transforming discontent into political protest and revolution (e.g France and Germany). - Critical = class antagonism as different interests overlap and collapse into class-based interests.
- Sara Maza = classes only exist if they were aware of their own existence.
- Complicated by different forms of the same class = lower middle class - artisans, shopkeepers and small employees.
5
Q
Middle Classes and bourgeois culture
A
- 19th = the century of the bourgeoisie - noting a decline of the aristocracy for the middle-class.
- End of feudalism = rise of the third French state which excluded the crown, aristocracy and religious elites = makes 1789 a key date.
- Benefited from the concepts of citizenship based on individual freedom and political participation and wider liberal ideas; supported capitalism and oppressing the Proletariat.
- Included: industrialists, teachers, artists, military (last - was dynastic loyalty more important than class status).
6
Q
Values between the ‘economic’ and ‘educated’ middle classes
A
- Distinction towards the aristocracy and lower classes.
- Similarities = urban lifestyle, formal education and support for progress and liberalism.
- Difference = substantial differences in income and views on political equality - e.g debate of suffrage based on tax or educational status.
- 1848 = core middle class makes up 5% of Europe and 15% of total population - not dominant yet makes considerable impact on developments.
7
Q
Role of the middle classes in 1848
A
- Affected by ideologies of Nationalism and liberalism.
- Economically interested in national markets and consumption of national ideology through the media.
- Failed = fear of popular radicalism forces the middle classes to ally with the State, causing the end of the Rev.
- Current bourgeois society has not destroyed class antagonisms, rather establishing new classes and oppressive conditions and struggles (Marx).
8
Q
Emergence of a new working class
A
- Range of categories: domestic servants, home industry, industrial workers and seasonable mobile workforce.
- Due to socio-political change, this enabled an erosion of traditional occupational status and identities.
- Industrial capitalism means workers don’t own the means of production and increases demand for labour - defined income by labour value.
- Creates the working class - achieves class consciousness and antagonises the bourgeoisie, creating political associations.
9
Q
Role of the working class and general impact of 1848
A
- General impact of socio-economic transformation industrialisation on the Revolution - notable differences in countries according to local traditions and extent of industrialisation.
+ Stronger effects of economic recession, harming employment and production (due to bad harvests).
+ Growth in literacy / education / political education / print revolution
+ Rising class consciousness contributes to articulation of political demands - Seen as a social revolution = Workers playing a key role on barricades and the spread of the revolution.
- Development of Trade Unionism and workers organisation as a consequence of freedom of association
- Class antagonism contributes to separation of Labour movement from Liberal movement (on the continent)
10
Q
Communist Manifesto
A
- minor factor in the political development of the revolution, but important impact on long-term developments
- Useful early document for the observation of economic change and its social consequences
- Global dimension of analysis - “spectre of communism”, separated from socialism, promoting communal ownership.
11
Q
Marx’s contemporary view of the unfolding of the 1848 revolution in Germany
A
- Some individuals were supportive yet the cabinet’s compromise with the bourgeoisie caused disillusionment - only attain a counter revolution or a social republic over a moderate constitutional monarchy.
- Hopeful but when compared to 1789, without effective leadership, the bourgeoisie and the momentum as a whole for the movement suffered.
- Britain made her citizens proletarians and enjoys military strength has previously “defrayed the cost of a European revolution”.
- Noted Britain’s domination over the world market controlled by bourgeoise - must overcome Britain in order for France to have a successful revolution, breaking Britain’s global role.
- King can only give what he receives and citizens get paid - breakdown of taxes and revenues leads to the collapse of the monarchy.
12
Q
Portrayal of the 1848 revolutions in Germany
A
- Not political but rather a social conflict between old and new society.
+ Old interests of feudal elites and the military forge alliances over how the crown, army and bureaucracy unite to take power back.
+ Unchanged association with the Crown and desire to maintain power - threatened by the working class.
13
Q
Marx’s defence speech
A
- Assumed the nature of law to be founded on a legal fiction - taken to be true when it is not necessarily.
- Society shapes the laws according to common interests and needs of society organically.
+ removes the imperial power divinely imposed and follows the elite’s interest.
+ old law is outdated as it prioritises minority interests over the majority, enabling sociopolitical crises in the future.
14
Q
Marx’s account of the 1848 Revolution
A
- Analysis of the 1848 revolution France against a background of class and economic interest.
- Explains roadblocks - not a defeat of the revolution, but the “pre-revolutionary traditional appendages”.
- General economic crisis = July monarchy depended on the bourgeois, exhausting state expenditure where they struggled to balance their interests and basic finances.
+ Growing power of the big bourgeoise and the financial aristocracy growing powerful - small section of the bourgeois which underpins the state with eclectic interests.
+ Explains state expenditure under Louis Phillipe compared to Napoleon - 400M francs compared to an average annual export of 750M. - Rising economic crisis after the failure of the february workshops increased discontent among the people.
- Conflict - neither class could establish their ideal society, as hijacked by Napoleon.
- refers to socialism as declaration of the permeance of the class revolution - the class dictatorship of the proletariat removed all class distinctions and sys of production.
15
Q
Main reasons for Louis Bonaparte’s coup d’etat on December 1851
A
- Dislike of the government - the new regimes was led by the bourgeoisie, isolating different social groups that made the revolution possible, yet few wanted to lead.
- division within the working class - no leader or central ideas.
- other interest groups that are not favourable to a conservative regime.
- Frustration over economic state of France and Britain.
- Politics was not working and required another alternative.
- progressive = provided universal suffrage, gained legal backing and unity.
- appealed to everyone’s interest and groups at different times,
16
Q
Guiding ideas of the Second Bonaparte
A
- consolidation of state power - creation of strong, independent government and state.
- individuals running it are quite a small circle with support from the army.
- he thinks this state’s power is not stable - only collapsed due to Germany.
- discusses a ecleptocratic regime = could make the First Bonaparte work by invading other countries for money for France - not applicable to modern Europe.
- solution = Algeria, part of France’s method to use imperial colonialism.
