Comrade or Brother?

A History of the British Labour Movement

Mary Davis

• Editorial: Pluto Press
• Año: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781783716708
• Edición: 2
• Categoría: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Categoría: Defensa política

Critical and iconoclastic, Comrade or Brother? traces the history of the British Labour Movement from its beginnings at the onset of industrialisation through its development within a capitalist society, up to the end of the twentieth-century. Written by a leading activist in the labour movement, the book redresses the balance in much labour history writing. It examines the place of women and the influence of racism and sexism as well as providing a critical analysis of the rival ideologies which played a role in the uneven development of the labour movement.

Part 1

The Industrial Revolution

1

ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL BACKGROUND, 1780–1850

Britain in 1850 would have been unrecognisable in every way to an adult who had fallen into a deep sleep in 1780 and awoken 70 years later. Of course, great changes occur in every society even within a shorter historical time span, but the changes in this period were so far-reaching that the commonly used term ‘industrial revolution’ to describe them hardly does justice to their magnitude. The changes were not sudden, nor were they confined to industry. During this 70-year period Britain was transformed from a predominantly agrarian and rural society into one whose wealth was based on industrial production and whose population was increasingly located in fast-expanding towns, some of which had been mere villages 70 years previously.

The visible changes were less significant than their underlying causes. Beneath the surface the balance of wealth creation and distribution was undergoing a radical change, the obvious (though not immediately perceptible) sign of which was a change in the class structure of Britain. This was not a matter of tinkering at the edges, but as hindsight shows turned out to be the most fundamental change in Britain’s class structure and class relations since the decline of serfdom. Bourgeois and proletarian came to replace peasant and lord as the dominant classes in society. This in its turn was reflected in political changes which finally enabled the new industrial capitalists, the new wealth creators, to emerge triumphant over the aristocracy. But in a peculiarly British compromise, the values of both sections of the old and new ruling class managed to find a consensus which ensured a degree of political stability not found in other European countries.

The Development of Capitalism

The term ‘industrial revolution’ also masks the true character of this era – it was one in which the capitalist mode of production assumed absolute dominance, a feat which could not have been possible without industrialisation, but was nonetheless not caused by it. Likewise, the industrial revolution did not bring about the use of machinery. Its significance lies in the fact that its discoveries enabled a new source of motive power (first water, then steam) to be harnessed to the already existing and new machinery. This in turn meant that full-scale mass commodity production became possible. The era of modern capitalist industry had begun.

The First Phase – Merchant Capital

Capitalism was not a sudden creation of the late eighteenth century. There were two distinct but linked phases in the history of capitalist production. The first phase, merchant capital, together with capitalist agriculture, emerged triumphant in the seventeenth century following its long battle with feudalism. Its success was represented politically by the victory of the Parliamentary side (represented by Oliver Cromwell and the Roundheads) over the old guard feudal aristocrats (represented by Charles I and the Cavaliers) in the English Civil War. This first phase of ‘immature’ commodity production was characterised by the fact that the instruments of production themselves were sufficiently ‘simple’ to permit their ownership by individual producers. Domestic production was controlled at first by the guilds, but later by richer craftsmen or by merchants who had accumulated capital through overseas trade. The establishment of the great livery companies in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is a reflection of this. These companies acquired a legal monopoly of their respective trades, whilst the huge trading companies, such as the East India Company, had a legal monopoly of overseas trade within their area of operation. Such monopoly privileges were protected by the state, which during much of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries operated on the basis of mercantilist economic theory.

‘Mercantilism’ held that the source of a nation’s wealth lay not in its productive capacity but in its trading strength. Hence the acquisition of favourable trade balances was the goal of the economy. Such a goal could only be achieved through economic regulation by the state. Consequently, a panoply of legislation, known collectively as the Navigation Laws, and the Old Colonial System, in addition to the granting of monopoly rights, was obligingly enacted and policed by the state. This might seem paradoxical given that English society including the state was dominated by the landowners, who were preoccupied with protecting their own interests. However, from the seventeenth century onwards there was an interdependent harmony between the merchants and the landowners – the former had the means and the money, the latter had the political power. The potential conflict between them was mitigated by the fact that the decay of feudalism enabled the wealthier merchants to invest their vast wealth in the land itself and hence to renew the ‘vitality’ of an otherwise decaying and parasitic landowning clique. It was this fresh injection of wealth into agriculture and the establishment of capitalist relations of production which enabled it, by the early eighteenth century, to become highly productive – in short, to undergo what is commonly termed an ‘agrarian revolution’, enabling England to become not only self-sufficient in food, but an exporter of grain. This in turn had an important impact in stimulating and sustaining an expansion in population, the significance of which became apparent only later. Much of this was accomplished with a great deal of political upheaval to which the battles of the seventeenth century bear testimony. Nonetheless, the harmony could only last while the means of production itself remained at its ‘immature’ phase and hence required no great amount of new capital investment to maintain a high profit. All that was required during this phase was state protection and monopoly rights for the few to ensure that there was no competition from ‘interlopers’. So, although merchant capital was linked to commodity production, such production could and did remain at a very basic level in the home country, supplemented as it was by exploitation of Britain’s colonies (the oldest of which was Ireland). Initially, these colonies were simply plundered, but later in the seventeenth century they also became important markets for English goods. This meant that they were themselves allowed to develop some production provided that this was strictly in accordance with the needs of the English and that any trade in the goods so produced was expropriated and controlled by England. This included, of course, the lucrative slave trade, which in itself permitted the development of the even more lucrative sugar, tobacco and cotton trades in the West Indies and later in the southern states of America (these latter also being English colonies). The trade in human beings initially was not confined to black people, but because the west coast of Africa provided such an abundance of human commodities (quite literally), the triangular trade (in which slaves were taken from Africa and transported in vile conditions to America or the West Indies) assumed great importance. It was hugely profitable in itself, but its significance was greater than providing greedy merchants with super-profits. Slavery provided, without knowing it, the bridge between merchant and industrial capital in Britain. It satisfied the former, while providing the latter with the raw material of their future wealth – raw cotton.

The Second Phase – Industrial Capital

The possibility of developing the means of production to enable capitalism to proceed to its fully industrial phase was in a sense linked to the very success of mercantilism. Vast stores of accumulated capital lay in readiness for productive investment in no matter what, but on the other hand, the lucrative opportunities for industrial investment developed in opposition to mercantilism. A new class of producers slowly developed outside the protected circles of the landowning/mercantile oligarchy. Such a development was not to be wondered at; its realisation was dependent on a number of factors, among which the technical inventions of the late eighteenth century acted as a spur. Most schoolchildren learn about Kay’s Flying Shuttle, Hargreave’s Spinning Jenny, Crompton’s Mule and other inventions (the most important of which was the steam engine), which revolutionised the means of production.

The practical utilisation of such technology only became possible when the conditions were ripe. These conditions were bequeathed by the success of merchant capital. For example, for industrial production to develop it is necessary to have a growing proportion of the population engaged solely in manufacture. This is only possible if society can produce enough surplus food first to stimulate and sustain a growth in population, and second to feed its non-agricultural workforce. Herein lies the significance of the agrarian revolution mentioned earlier, and the enclosure movement to which it was linked. It is quite wrong to suppose that enclosures drove people off the land and forced them into the towns – the so-called enforced proletarianisation thesis. Whilst it is true that enclosures did alter the system of landownership in favour of ever-larger estates, it had the effect, certainly in the short term, of increasing the demand for agricultural labour. The fact that the population continued to grow throughout the eighteenth century also enabled the growth of the domestic market for manufactured goods. In addition, favourable conditions were in being through the existence of developed markets overseas, a reasonable system of transport and a sophisticated commercial infrastructure, including a banking system through which the capital accumulated from this first phase of trade and production could be redirected to any more profitable enterprise when the opportunity arose.

The Cotton Industry

The first industry to be fully prepared for such a challenge was the cotton industry. First spinning (using the labour of women and children) and then weaving were fully mechanised and gradually relocated in large factories near a source of motive power to drive the new machines. It was, however, slavery which made the whole development possible in the first place. Raw cotton cannot be grown in Britain; it is a wholly imported raw material from the plantations of the West Indies and North America, and such plantations were worked entirely by the labour of slaves.

At first water power was used to drive the machines which processed the raw cotton. Thus the early factories were located near fast-flowing streams (hence the use of the term cotton ‘mill’), but later, after the invention of the steam engine, the mills were moved to be within easy reach of coal – the new energy source. South Lancashire provided an ideal site for the cotton industry, not only because of its coalfields, but also because of its canal link with Liverpool where the imported raw cotton entered the country, and from which the manufactured product could be exported. The technology of steam power allied to other inventions was applied later to other branches of the textile industry (woollen cloth and linen), and later still to such industries as iron and steel production. Cotton it was that paved the way.

The preconditions for industrial development were laid in previous centuries of capitalist development. It was mass production, not capitalism, which was the new discovery. The question remains why it was not simply a smooth transition from its first to its later stage rather than, as it proved to be, an almighty upheaval, socially, politically and ideologically. This second phase of capitalist development required not only an improvement in the means of production, but also a major change in the relations of production – such change could not be ‘accommodated’ within the existing system, for it presented a direct challenge to it. In short, it challenged the landed and merchant oligarchy which had ruled Britain in the preceding centuries. The confrontation might have been a revolutionary one, as it was in other European countries, but for the fact that the landed aristocracy in Britain displayed an infinite capacity to adapt and compromise. It had already displayed such a capacity in the post-feudal era by the transformation of agrarian class relations and its compromise with merchant capital for the mutual benefit of both. Rich merchants had bought their way into political power by themselves becoming landowners. In this sense the compromise was not as painful for the aristocracy, which by this time had thrown off all its feudal relics and was fully capitalised. The term aristocracy is thus slightly misleading, but is used to distinguish ennobled landowning capitalists from their merchant, commercial or industrial counterparts. Furthermore, the use of this term implies, as it should, a continuity with a very old landed class, which in Britain, more than in any other European country, retained its estates almost intact for centuries. The reason for this was the strict enforcement of property laws, in particular primogeniture and strict settlement and entail. These were the rules whereby property (in the form of land) had to be passed intact to the eldest son. Three very important consequences flowed, unwittingly, from this. First, the land was preserved in large estates and hence was amenable to techniques which would increase its yield and change its production relations; second, it meant that a peasantry (a peasant being someone who owns his land, albeit a small plot) hardly existed in Britain; and third, it meant that those who had money could not buy land but formed instead dynastic or commercial alliances with those who owned it. The fact that Britain by the mid eighteenth century still remained a country whose main source of wealth was the land masks the reality of the penetration of capital into agricultural production and the interrelationship between agrarian, commercial and merchant capital.

Industrial capital, however, posed a much more far-reaching challenge to the old system. The new factory owners were not interested in the slightest in buying their way into the landed aristocracy. They were busy transforming Britain into a country whose predominant source of wealth was industrial rather than agricultural production. They were ready to challenge the old order root and branch if it stood in the way of their relentless pursuit of surplus value.

Politics and Ideology

The entrepreneurs who pioneered the process of industrialisation did not emerge from the charmed circles of the existing ruling class. Rather, they were more likely to have been small masters or richer artisans keen to exploit a good thing when they saw it. The new technology did not require a vast capital outlay in the early stages and anyway most enterprises were fairly small scale, at least at the start. The main obstacles in the path of this phase of capital development lay in the fact that the entire economic and political system was geared to preserving monopoly privileges for the old order. The right to vote and to be elected was restricted in the main to those who owned land and were card-carrying members of the Church of England. The right to overseas trade was strictly controlled by the great trading companies and was encumbered by a bewildering array of import and export duties. The House of Commons and the two main parties within it, Whig and Tory, existed to preserve such privileges against not only the ‘swinish multitude’ (Edmund Burke’s phrase) but also against the new threat of these industrial parvenu interlopers. Small wonder then that, in their opposition to the Great Corruption of church and state, the new class of entrepreneurs appeared so radical at the end of the eighteenth century.

The new industrialists had their own (nonconformist) denomination of Christianity and their own economic and political theories to guide them. Adam Smith, David Ricardo, James Mill and Jeremy Bentham were their ideological mentors. The new ‘science’ of classical political economy, founded by Smith, was developed in opposition to mercantilism. The notions of laissez-faire, free trade and freedom for the operation of the market mechanism were in sharp contrast to the established traditions of protectionism and state intervention. Smith and his school even opposed Britain’s existing colonial policy, supporting American independence on the grounds that if America remained a British colony, its economy would continue to stagnate and hence it would be a less useful market for British manufactured goods.

Although the British government was forced to recognise the fact of American independence by 1783, the needs of the growing new business community were hardly noticed, let alone catered for. Contemporary observers of whatever political persuasion were not sure how to assess the as yet small-scale changes in the economy. In any case, the long war with France from 1793 to 1815 and the attempts to defeat British radicalism (itself inspired by the French Revolution) were the sole concern of public policy. During these years, however, textile and armaments manufacturers flourished. By 1815, with most of Europe in a state of economic collapse and the American market ready to buy as much as Britain could produce now that the French wartime economic blockade was lifted, great new opportunities existed for the take-off of mass production techniques using the new technology.

The postwar government appeared impervious to such developments. Under Lord Liverpool the Tories continued to act in the interests of their class. The symbol of protectionist policies was the Corn Laws of 1815 – a piece of legislation based more on dogma than on reason. A set-piece battle loomed between the unenfranchised owners of the ‘new money’ and the ruling-class representatives of ‘old wealth’. By 1822, however, it was clear that the moment of crisis had passed – the ruling class had seen the danger and were prepared to compromise. Surprisingly enough, it was the Tories who took the initiative. They were the party most responsible for changing Britain’s economic policy to accommodate the needs of the industrialists, while the Whigs, when in power, initiated the corresponding political reforms. Together, both were enough to buy off the ‘captains of industry’ and hence to ensure a fusion of the old and the new money, so avoiding the political and social upheavals that rocked the thrones of most other European countries in 1830 and 1848. The secret unlocked by the British ruling class in the first half of the nineteenth century was to detach any opposition from the force the rulers feared most – the working people. A victory for the masses would entail a lasting defeat for the existing order; far better then to head off such a threat by a voluntary change of attitude from above.

The old Toryism was incapable of perceiving the need for such concession. Toryism in general was rescued by such men as William Huskisson (President of the Board of Trade), Robert Peel (Home Secretary) and George Canning (Foreign Secretary) and others, all of who...