TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0001
[social change, social movements, radicalism, progress, tradition, state power, capitalism, social relations, social order, public sphere]
During the nineteenth century, “social movement” was associated with social change, particularly change stemming from the material conditions and social relations of the majority of people, and would later place more emphasis on the importance of collective action to achieve, or at least hasten, progress. It turned into a socialist movement or the broad collection of labor and democratic mobilizations. Drawing on four lines of research on social movements, this book explores the rise of radicalism in the early nineteenth century, looking at the idea of progress and how it contributes to a misunderstanding of the relationship of tradition and resistance to social change. The book discusses the role of both state power and capitalism in the way social relations affecting individuals and local communities are organized, and also considers the importance of radicalism that reflects roots in the existing social order or culture. Finally, it examines how social movements grew in integral relationship to the modern public sphere. (pages 1 - 11)
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Resituating Radicalism - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0002
[radicalism, social order, radical reformation, conventional politics, capitalism, social relations, rationalism, William Cobbett, radical protest, communitarian traditionalism]
This chapter discusses different meanings of radicalism, with an emphasis on the importance of radicalism that reflects roots in existing social order or culture more than a complete rationalist program of transformation. It first examines “Radical Reformation” and how some of its millenarian branches gave rise to movements that remained prominent through the nineteenth century as alternatives to conventional politics, capitalism, and social relations. These movements included Hutterites, Amish, and Mennonites. The chapter then looks at how rationalist rethinking of the foundations of social order emerged as one of the most prominent legacies of both Reformation and Enlightenment to radical politics. It also considers how radicalism became more widely associated with rationalism on the Continent, especially in France and Holland, than in Britain. Moreover, the chapter analyzes William Cobbett's articulation of an enduring dimension of radical protest called communitarian traditionalism throughout the early nineteenth century. (pages 12 - 42)
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Social Movements and the Idea of Progress - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0003
[social movements, resource mobilization, progress, tradition, democracy, republicanism, social question, poverty, class relations, social change]
The roots of the modern social movement can be traced to Europe and America in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly the Great Awakening in the American colonies and religious mobilizations during the Protestant Reformation in Europe. By the early nineteenth century, the social movement was a form of collective action transposable across issues and populations to express grievances and desires. Theorists of “resource mobilization” focused on how people organize and marshal resources to pursue these grievances or desires. This chapter examines the limitations of the notion of a Left–Right political spectrum for understanding social movements that resisted prevailing ideas of progress and rooted in tradition. It looks at how the idea of social movement combined with democracy and republicanism to bring about a new notion of society. The chapter also discusses the “social question” raised by capitalist industrialization, along with poverty and class relations, as well as arguments that material necessity made social change inevitable. (pages 43 - 81)
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The Radicalism of Tradition: Community Strength or Venerable Disguise and Borrowed Language? - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0004
[revolutions, Karl Marx, radicalism of tradition, collective action, reactionary radicals, community, working class, artisans, industrialization, reformism]
Theorists of popular insurrections disagree with the suggestion that revolutions are risky undertakings. Karl Marx offered an important argument for the rationality of revolution that takes into account necessary historical progress and which maintains that revolution would be in the rational interest of the class of workers created by industrial capitalism. This chapter examines the paradoxical-sounding “radicalism of tradition” and challenges the notion that radical change comes always from those with the most consistent program of change. After commenting on Marx's theory of proletarian collective action, it looks at an important range of “reactionary radicals” in early nineteenth-century France and England. The chapter then considers tradition and community, and shows how “conservative” attachments to both concepts may lead to quite rational participation in the most radical mobilizationsm, which sometimes culminate in revolutions. Finally, it considers why the modern working class has not shown the tendency for radicalism which artisans displayed during the period of European industrialization, and argues that reformism, not revolution, is its “natural” form of action. (pages 82 - 120)
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The Public Sphere in the Field of Power - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0005
[public opinion, eighteenth-century england, public sphere, Jürgen Habermas, democracy, britain, political public, counterpublics, radical politics, radicalism]
In eighteenth-century England, public opinion emerged as an important force that government had to contend with and to which politicians were obligated to listen. There were struggles not only about which ideas would dominate in the public sphere, but who could speak and what could be said. According to Jürgen Habermas, the political public sphere occupies a central role as an institutional formation—and an ideal—underlying democracy. This chapter examines the idea of the public sphere in Britain during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It considers how the dominant political public was shaped by exclusion of the most extremely dissident voices and the extent to which “counterpublics” may accommodate failures of larger public spheres. Finally, the chapter discusses radical politics and the limits of elite radicalism. (pages 121 - 151)
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The Reluctant Counterpublic - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0006
[public sphere, Karl Marx, bourgeois democracy, Jürgen Habermas, Thomas J. Wooler, radicalism, politics, counterpublics, intellectuals, Thomas Paine]
Liberal theory assumes that private property and political independence are intertwined, a relationship built into classical conceptions of the public sphere during the eighteenth century. Based on this notion, independence grounded in private existence allowed people to reason in disinterested ways about public affairs. Such “bourgeois” thinking was rejected by Karl Marx, who dismissed bourgeois democracy and instead advocated a revolutionary class struggle that would transcend any politics of individual opinions. In contrast, Jürgen Habermas saw unfulfilled radical and progressive potential in the categories of bourgeois democracy. The debate between liberalists and Marxists over bourgeois realities makes it hard to understand radicals such as Thomas J. Wooler, a key voice in English popular radicalism who fought for an integrated public sphere and resigned himself, along with other radicals, only reluctantly to a politics of counterpublics. This chapter explores the response of rationalist intellectuals, often followers of Thomas Paine, to the idea of the public sphere, and how the dominant political public was shaped by exclusion of the most radical voices. (pages 152 - 180)
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Class, Place, and Industrial Revolution - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0007
[local community, radicalism, collective action, class struggle, interpersonal relationships, capitalism, democracy, britain, industrial revolution]
This chapter examines the role of place and local community in workers' radicalism, and the challenges of trying to extend collective action at the national level. It first discusses the distinction between class struggle and popular mobilizations based on community or other direct interpersonal relationships. The chapter then considers the importance of communications and transportation infrastructures as part of the material basis for class struggle, even though these were only developed adequately to this purpose as capitalism's continuing Industrial Revolution exceeded the level it had achieved in the first third or even half of the nineteenth century. It also argues that class struggles are often caught within certain limits imposed by capitalism and capitalist democracy, and tackles these issues using historical examples from Britain. (pages 181 - 196)
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Industrialization and Social Radicalism: British and French Workers’ Movements and the Mid‑Nineteenth‑Century Crises - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0008
[revolutions, workers, france, industrialization, britain, social organization, radicalism, economic change, social republic]
During the nineteenth century, repeated revolutions in which workers played a major part rocked France. However, these workers failed to capture and hold state power, a “failure” that historians have commonly attributed to France's “backwardness.” Major examples of revolutions in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were observed in countries undergoing economic change, often in the direction of capitalist industrialization—a pattern followed by most later revolutions. This chapter focuses on craft and industrial workers, and on how the former tended to be more radical and the latter more open to ameliorative reform. It argues that many of the comparisons, both implicit and explicit, of nineteenth-century France and Britain have been misleading. The chapter maintains that continuity with preindustrial social organization was important in the struggle to realize a “democratic and social republic” between 1848 and 1851. It also looks at how the history of popular radicalism in Britain is misunderstood. (pages 197 - 227)
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Classical Social Theory and the French Revolution of 1848 - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0009
[radicalism, Alexis de Tocqueville, Karl Marx, class struggle, french revolution, classical social theory, utopian socialism, anarchism, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, syndicalism]
Alexis de Tocqueville and Karl Marx both viewed the revolutions of the mid-nineteenth century not only as echoes of 1789 and other predecessors, but also as harbingers of something new. For de Tocqueville, there was a threat to social order in the increasing protests of 1847 and 1848, driven not only by revolution but also by the eruption of a dangerous and continually growing struggle of class against class. Marx also saw this class struggle and argued that it was the bourgeoisie who forced the workers into combat. This chapter examines the French Revolution of 1848, which involved workers with a “radical” position distinct from liberalism, and how it influenced classical social theory indirectly. It looks at the tradition linking utopian socialism, communitarian radicalism, and some forms of anarchism. The chapter also considers Pierre-Joseph Proudhon's views on syndicalism and the lessons derived by classical social theory from the revolution of 1848. (pages 228 - 248)
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New Social Movements of the Early Nineteenth Century - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0010
[new social movements, labor movement, exceptionalism, identity politics, america, feminism, social movements, politicization]
The early nineteenth century saw the rise of “new social movements” such as feminism, the ecology movement or “greens,” the youth movement, the peace movement, and other initiatives aimed at legitimating personal identity or lifestyle. These movements worked outside formal institutional channels and deemphasized economic goals, instead focusing on the politicization of everyday life. This chapter looks at the “new social movements” and argues that they were not really novel because their major characteristics were also present in social movements in America during the early nineteenth century, particularly the labor movement. It thus refutes both notions of American exceptionalism and the historical claim that late twentieth-century social movements were of a fundamentally new kind. The chapter also explores identity politics and other features common to movements throughout the modern period, considering broad historical patterns in the activity, diversity, and integration of social movement fields. (pages 249 - 281)
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Progress for Whom? - Craig Calhoun
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226090870.003.0011
[social movements, capitalism, democracy, radicalism, tradition, local communities, public sphere, social change, labor politics, progress]
Many of the social movements that arose in the early nineteenth century involved workers who resisted capitalism and sought democracy, and were characterized by commitments to traditional culture, close-knit communities, and craft institutions. Commitments to traditional cultural values and directly interpersonal communal relations may reflect either conservatism or radicalism. Radicalism presents a paradox: while it is largely based on tradition and local communities, once it succeeds it both disrupts tradition and directs power toward the center of society and its large-scale systems of control. The organization of markets, government, and the public sphere at the national level was not advantageous to those whose organizational strength was greater and whose intellectual perspectives were sharper at local levels. This chapter explores how a somewhat different understanding of the nineteenth century might matter for the study of social change in general and social moments in particular. It argues that the movements of the earlier era must not be viewed as either mere precursors to conventional labor politics or as a unidirectional image of progress. (pages 282 - 316)
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Notes
Bibliography
Index
