Beatrice Webb
Beatrice Webb was a British sociologist, economist, and social reformer who, along with her husband Sidney Webb, played a significant role in the founding of the London School of Economics and Political Science. She was a key figure in the development of the British welfare state and is known for her influential work on poverty, labor conditions, and social policy.
3 Key excerpts on "Beatrice Webb"
- Robert McMurray, Alison Pullen(Authors)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...3 Beatrice Webb Social investigator David Jacobs and Rosetta Morris Beatrice Webb, née Potter, was born on 22 January 1858, to Richard and Laurencina Potter (Muggeridge and Adams, 1968; Polkingham and Thomson, 1998). She was the eighth of nine daughters and the product of an elite society. She lived in beautiful homes with servants, from one season to the next, and enjoyed the privileges of high society. Her early childhood education was provided by governesses. Subsequently, she educated herself by reading a wide array of books on various subjects, including religion and philosophy. According to Muggeridge and Adam (1968, p. 49), she was concerned about equality at the early age of 15, when she visited Brigham Young’s Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City and scorned the inferior treatment of the leaders’ wives. At 16, she declared that she was fascinated by Joaquin Miller’s writings on the influence of civilisation on progress and nations. By the time she was 21 years old, she wrote in her diary that she was going to live a serious life to help fulfil the “law of progress”. She was soon to become “improvident, unconventional, non-conformist” (Muggeridge and Adams, 1968: p. 11), determined to tear down the old order and make way for the new. Webb was a prolific author and student of organizations, who challenged the myopia of many neoclassical economists by investigating the actual conditions of the British working class. She explored the practices and institutions of working-class neighbourhoods neglected by the middle class. She pioneered empirical approaches in the social sciences and provided a remarkable example of engaged scholarship. As with any writer, it is profitable to situate Webb’s ideas, practices and personality in a social and historical context. Her demonstrated values, roles and intellectual contributions reveal an individual engaged in a dialogue with her environment...
eBook - ePub- Gregory Claeys(Author)
- 2013(Publication Date)
- CQ Press(Publisher)
...Clive E. Hill Clive E. Hill Webb, Sidney and Beatrice Webb, sidney and beatrice 849 850 Webb, Sidney and Beatrice In the development of both reformist socialism and British social historiography, Sidney Webb (1859–1947) and Beatrice Potter Webb (1858–1943) were significant individuals, as well as being a married couple (from 1892), intellectual partners from slightly earlier, and the joint authors of many encyclopedic volumes. Their contribution to modern political thought included important reflections on the relationship among liberalism, social democracy, and communism, and on education, public services, and industrial democracy. The Webbs first met in 1890 and soon established a strong political rapport. Sidney received his early education in London, Switzerland, and Germany, but his lower middle-class family was insufficiently affluent for him to study as a full-time undergraduate, and so, in 1886, he completed a part-time, external degree in law at the University of London while working as a civil servant. He subsequently became a full-time writer. In contrast, Beatrice Potter was the largely self-educated daughter of a wealthy businessman, who achieved financial independence thanks to a significant inheritance from her father in 1892, and she was originally less inclined toward party politics. Beatrice is usually seen as the leader of the partnership, and both her early writings on poverty and her first book, The Co-operative Movement in Britain (1891), are classics of their particular genres. However, Sidney was a notable figure in Liberal and Labour politics for more than 50 years; produced a significant, independent body of writing on many subjects; and in later life (the 1920s and 1930s) served as a Labour MP, a peer (Baron Passfield), and a government minister...
eBook - ePubThe Webbs, Fabianism and Feminism
Fabianism and the Political Economy of Everyday Life
- Peter Beilharz, Chris Nyland(Authors)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...In the afternoon session the central topic was 'Women as Wives and Mothers' and the list of speakers for the session included Barbara Drake and Marion Phillips. Webb's opening remarks to the Conference highlighted the fact that she and the Executive Committee of the F.W.G. held very similar positions both on the question of "equal pay for equal work" and on the need for women who had entered industry during the war to refrain from becoming blacklegs. In concluding her address, she warned that unless women demanded men's employment conditions there would be a great disaster looming ahead for them. The conference on the economic position of women marks a turning point in the relationship between Webb and the F.W.G. Henceforth, along with other socialist feminists, she would increasingly look to the Labour Party as the most important vehicle for promoting women's social, political and economic position. With her turn to the Party, she became convinced that the Women's Group had to tailor its agenda to the reformist programmes of larger and more influential organisations. Her conviction that this was the focus which women socialists must take was reinforced by the impact the passing of the Representation of the People Act of June 1918 had on both Labour Party parliamentary representation and on feminist activism in the wider community. The Act extended suffrage to all men without qualification and ceded the vote to women over thirty years old. This was a development Beatrice considered truly outstanding but typically saw the passage of the law as an important victory not only for women and formerly disenfranchised men but also for the working class...
