Chapter 27 Chapter 1 Development Chapter 6 Revolution 4

4 The issue is inflammatory everywhere except the United States.No one in America can or cannot resist making the decision to mobilize ordinary people politically, as Jacksonian democracy has done (except, of course, for slaves in the South).Despite the emergence of the Workingmen's Party in the United States in 1828-1829, European-style social revolution was not yet a serious problem in that vast and rapidly developing country, although local dissatisfaction remained.Nor is the issue inflammatory in Latin America, with the possible exception of Mexico, where no one, for whatever purpose, is politically mobilizing Indians (i.e., peasants and farm laborers), black slaves, or even "half-breeds" (i.e., farmers, artisans and the urban poor).But in Western Europe, it is practical and feasible for the urban poor to carry out a social revolution, and in the vast European area where the agricultural revolution is taking place, the question of whether to appeal to the masses is even more urgent and inevitable.

In Western Europe, the growing discontent of the poor, especially the urban poor, can be seen everywhere.Even in Vienna, where the emperor lived, the dissatisfaction of the poor can be reflected in the popular suburban theaters. The dramas staged in the theaters faithfully present the voices of the common people and the petty bourgeoisie like a mirror.During the Napoleonic period, the theater combined comfort and gentleness with innocent loyalty to the Habsburgs. Ferdinand Raimund, the greatest theater writer in the 1920s, used a stage filled with fairy tales, sadness and nostalgia to mourn the innocence left by the simple, traditional and poor people.But from 1835 onwards the stage was occupied by a shining star (Johann Nestroy).A well-known sociopolitical satirist, acerbic and polemical wit, he was also a saboteur, and in 1848, quite in character, a revolutionary fanatic.Even the Germanic settlers who came to America via Le Havre cited "there is no king there" as their reason for emigrating.America began in the 1820s as a dream country for poor Europeans.

In western Europe, urban discontent is widespread.Proletarian and socialist movements can already be seen in the dual revolutions of Britain and France (see Chapter 11).Such movements appeared in England around 1830, and took the form of an extremely mature mass movement of the working poor.They saw the Whigs and Liberals as their possible traitors, and the capitalists as their inevitable enemies.This movement reached its peak in 1839-1842, and the "People's Charter" movement, which still maintained a huge influence after 1848, was its greatest achievement.British socialism, or "corporatism," was much weaker by comparison.Beginning in the memorable period 1829-1834, some absorbed large numbers of working-class fighters to their theories (they had been propagated among artisans and skilled workers from the early 1820s), while others were ambitious. The working class, under the influence of the Owenists, even attempted to establish a comprehensive cooperative economy by bypassing capitalism.Disappointment with the Reform Act of 1832 led most members of the labor movement to look to these Owenists, Cooperatives, and early Revolutionary Syndicalists for leadership, but since they were unable to concretize an effective set of political strategies and leadership This policy, combined with the planned attacks of the employers and the government, resulted in the defeat of the 1834-1836 movement.This failure reduced many socialists to either propagandists or educational groups outside the mainstream of the labor movement, or to pioneers of the more moderate consumer cooperatives, first in the form of cooperative shops opened in Lancaster in 1844. Summer's Rochdale first appeared.Paradoxically, therefore, Chartism, the pinnacle of the mass movement of the working poor in England, was somewhat less ideologically advanced than the 1829-34 movement, though politically more mature.Still, it was not immune to failure, because its leaders were politically incompetent, divided between regions and departments, and they were incapable of organizing national unity beyond the preparation of outlandish petitions. action.

In France there was no comparable mass movement of the industrial working poor. The French "working class movement" from 1830 to 1848 had its fighters mainly from among the handicraftsmen and helpers in the old towns, and most of them took place in the skilled industry or in the centers of traditional cottage industries such as the Lyon silk industry (the initiator of the first revolution in Lyon Not even hired workers but a bunch of small business owners).Moreover, the various brand new "utopian" socialisms (Saint-Simon, Fourier, Cabet, and others) were not interested in political agitation, although their small clandestine meetings and groups (especially the Fourierists) ), at the beginning of the revolution of 1848, mostly acted as the leading nucleus of the working class and the mobilizer of the mass movement.France, on the other hand, had a strong left-wing tradition that was politically highly developed, such as Jacobinism and Babeufism, the main elements of which became communist after 1830.One of the most troublesome leaders was Blanqui (Auguste Blanqui, 1805-1881), a student of Buonarroti.

From the perspective of social analysis and theory, in addition to affirming the necessity of socialism, affirming that the exploited wage-earner proletariat is the builder of socialism, and affirming that the middle class (no longer the upper middle class) is the main enemy of socialism, etc. Beyond perception, Blanquism contributed little to socialism.But in terms of political strategy and organization, Blanquism can help traditional fraternal revolutionary institutions to adapt to the conditions of the proletariat and integrate traditional methods of Jacobin revolution, insurrection and centralized people's dictatorship into the workers' cause among.From the Blanquists (in succession Saint-Just, Babeuf, and Buonarroti) the modern socialist revolutionary movement was convinced that its goal must be the seizure of power and then the "dictatorship of the proletariat"—the term is Created by Blanqui molecules.The weakness of Blanquism is the weakness of the French working class.Like their Carbonari forerunners, they were a handful of elites who planned riots in vain, only to fail because they lacked broad popular support, like the attempted uprising in 1839.

Thus in Western Europe, working-class or urban revolution appears to be a very real danger, although in reality, in most industrial countries like Great Britain and Belgium, the governments and the employers' Conclusion: There is no evidence that the British government was ever seriously disturbed by the threat to public order from the large, dispersed, poorly organized and poorly led Charter Party.On the other hand, rural populations did little to encourage revolutionaries and threaten rulers.In England, when a wave of machine-breaking riots spread rapidly from starving workers in the south and east of England in late 1830, there was a moment of panic in the government.In this spontaneous, widespread, but quickly quelled "last workers' uprising," it can be seen that

Seeing the impact of the July Revolution in France in 1830, those who participated in the riots were punished much harsher than the Chartists, perhaps because everyone feared that there would be a more tense political situation than during the period of the Reform Act.However, agricultural unrest quickly returned to a less politically dire state.In other economically advanced regions, outside of western Germany, it is difficult to expect or imagine any major agricultural revolution, and the purely urban perspective held by most revolutionaries did not appeal to farmers.In Western Europe (excluding the Iberian peninsula), only Ireland had a broad and specific agricultural revolutionary movement, initiated by widespread secret terrorist societies such as the Ribbonmen and the Whiteboys.But socially and politically, Ireland belongs to a different world than its neighbors.

Thus the middle-class radicals, that group of disaffected industrialists, intellectuals and others who found themselves still opposed to the moderate liberal government of 1830, were divided over the question of social revolution.In Britain, the "middle-class radicals" split between those who were prepared to support or fight with Chartism (such as the Complete Suffrage Union in Birmingham) and those who insisted on opposing both the aristocracy and the Charter Movements (eg Manchester Anti-Corn Law League).The uncompromising prevailed, believing in the greater coherence of their class consciousness, in the vast sums they spent and in the efficiency of their propaganda and advertising agencies.In France, the weakening of the official opposition of Louis Philippe and the creativity of the revolutionary masses in Paris shook the split between the two.The radical poet Beranger wrote after the February Revolution of 1848: "So we are republicans again, perhaps too soon, too soon ... I should prefer a more cautious procedure, But we have neither the time to choose, nor the strength to gather, nor the course to decide on.” In France, the break between middle-class radicals and the extreme left did not occur until after the revolution.

For the petty bourgeoisie of independent artisans, shopkeepers, farmers (who allied themselves with skilled workers) who were likely to form the main armies of radicalism in Western Europe, the pressure of the question was not so great.As petty men, they sympathize with the poor against the rich; as small proprietors, they sympathize with the rich against the poor.But this split in sympathy, while causing them to hesitate, does not bring about a big change in political allegiance.At critical moments, they were Jacobins, republicans, and democrats, though weak.In all Popular Fronts they are a wavering element, but also a constant until the would-be dispossessors actually come to power.