Social change in nineteenth century England- Wiener’s view of history

 In 1983 every member of Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet received a copy of a book by Martin Wiener: English culture and the decline of the industrial spirit. In the book Wiener argued that early Victorian England had been an industrial powerhouse, but that this was short lived because traditional forces including public schools, the Church and a resurgent aristocracy fostered an anti-progressive environment. For example the Arts and Crafts movement championed by William Morris and John Ruskin was one where some people sneered at mass production and economic growth.

For Wiener the late Victorians became villains in national decline in England, founding such heritage organisations as the National Trust and magazines like Country Life. A lot of businesses received no investment and the wealth on industrial capital was submerged into the passive wealth of land and property. Cycling, recreational walking and camping became popular as the countryside became a place of tradition, recuperation and pleasure. Poets of the time were mostly worshippers of nature. Pressure groups to maintain public rights of access to Common land and to restore it to common ownership were started.

Garden cities such as Welwyn and Letchworth emerged from these sentiments along with industrial model villages like Bourneville in Birmingham. In 1824 John Cadbury had opened a shop in Bull Street in Birmingham. His sons moved this business to larger premises on the outskirts of the city in 1879. By 1900 the site contained 313 cottages in 330 acres of land. These cottages were homes for the workers. Motivated by their Quaker beliefs the Cadbury family had resolved to “alleviate the evils of modern cramped living conditions” in a well planned community around a “factory in a garden”.

George Cadbury wanted each cottage to possess: eight apple and pear trees, twelve gooseberry bushes and six creepers such as wisteria, honeysuckle and clematis according to the aspect of the property. As labour in factories had been seen as degrading, working on the land was now of great value. Supposed traditions of English rural life like maypole dancing became the alternatives to the gin alleys of grimy cities.

Other historians have argued that the late nineteenth century did not have such marked industrial decline and membership of organisations did not expand significantly until much later. Peter Stansky suggests that the late Victorian quest to return to the land was a result of an advanced industrial modernity that could support the self image of wealthy individuals as involved in county life. When you see how the countryside is used in twenty first century England, what changes do you notice?

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