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Robert Owen

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1750-1900; Political People

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   Robert Owen ( 14 May 1771, Newtown, Powys – 17 November 1858) was a
   Welsh socialist and social reformer. He is considered the father of the
   cooperative movement.

   Owen's socialistic philosophy was derived from three fundamental
   pillars of his thought. First, he believed that no one was "responsible
   for his will and his own actions" because "his whole character is
   formed independently of himself." Owen firmly believed that people were
   the product of their environment, which fueled his support for
   education and labor reform. His views made Owen a pioneer in the
   promotion of investment in human capital. Owen's second pillar was his
   opposition to religion. Owen felt that all religions were "based on the
   same absurd imagination" which he said made mankind "a weak, imbecile
   animal; a furious bigot and fanatic; or a miserable hypocrite."
   [However, he did embrace spiritualism towards the end of his life
   (O'Hara, 2006, p.75).] His third pillar said that he disliked the
   factory system, and supported the cottage system.

Biography

   Robert Owen
   Robert Owen

Philanthropy in New Lanark (1800)

     Block quote

   During a visit to Glasgow he fell in love with Caroline Dale, the
   daughter of the New Lanark mill's proprietor David Dale. Owen induced
   his partners to purchase New Lanark, and after his marriage with
   Caroline in September 1799, he set up home there. He was manager and
   part owner of the mills (January 1800). Encouraged by his great success
   in the management of cotton factories in Manchester, he hoped to
   conduct New Lanark on higher principles and focus less on commercial
   principles.

   The factory of New Lanark had been started in 1791 by Dale and Richard
   Arkwright. The water power afforded by the falls of the Clyde made it a
   great attraction. About two thousand people had associations with the
   mills. Five hundred of them were children who were brought at the age
   of five or six from the poorhouses and charities of Edinburgh and
   Glasgow. The children had been well treated by Dale, but the general
   condition of the people was very unsatisfactory. Many of the workers
   were in the lowest levels of the population; theft, drunkenness, and
   other vices were common; education and sanitation were neglected; and
   most families lived in only one room. The respectable country people
   refused to submit to the long hours and demoralizing drudgery of the
   factories.

   Many employers operated the truck system, whereby payment to the
   workers was made in part or totally by tokens. These tokens had no
   value outside the factory owner's "truck shop." The owners were able to
   supply shoddy goods to the truck shop and still charge top prices. A
   series of "Truck Acts" (1831-1887) stopped this abuse. The Acts made it
   an offence not to pay employees in common currency. Owen opened a store
   where the people could buy goods of sound quality at little more than
   cost, and he placed the sale of alcohol under strict supervision. He
   sold quality goods and passed on the savings from the bulk purchase of
   goods to the workers. These principles became the basis for the
   co-operative shops in Britain that continue to trade today.

   His greatest success, however, was in the education of the young, to
   which he devoted special attention. He was the founder of infant
   schools in Great Britain. Though his reform ideas resemble European
   reform ideas of the time, he was likely not influenced by the overseas
   views; his ideas of the ideal education were his own.

   Though at first regarded with suspicion as a stranger, he soon won the
   confidence of his people. The mills continued to have great commercial
   success, but some of Owen's schemes involved considerable expense,
   which displeased his partners. Tired at last of the restrictions
   imposed on him by men who wished to conduct the business on the
   ordinary principles, Owen formed a new firm. The workers at his firm,
   content with 5% of return for their capital, were ready to give freer
   scope to his philanthropy (1813). In this firm, Jeremy Bentham and a
   well-known Quaker, William Allen, were partners. In the same year, Owen
   first authored several essays in which he expounded on the principles
   which underlay his education philosophy.

   Owen had originally been a follower of the classical liberal and
   utilitarian Jeremy Bentham. However, as time passed Owen became more
   and more socialist, whereas Bentham thought that free markets (in
   particular, the rights for workers to move and choose their employers)
   would free the workers from the excess power of the capitalists.

   From an early age, he had lost all belief in the prevailing forms of
   religion and had thought out a creed for himself, which he considered
   an entirely new and original discovery. The chief points in this
   philosophy were that man's character is made not by him but for him;
   that it has been formed by circumstances over which he had no control;
   that he is not a proper subject either of praise or blame. These
   principles lead up to the practical conclusion that the great secret in
   the right formation of man's character is to place him under the proper
   influences - physical, moral and social - from his earliest years.
   These principles - of the irresponsibility of man and of the effect of
   early influences - form the key to Owen's whole system of education and
   social amelioration. They are embodied in his first work, A New View of
   Society, or Essays on the Principle of the Formation of the Human
   Character, the first of these essays (there are four in all) appearing
   in 1813. Owen's new views theoretically belong to a very old system of
   philosophy, and his originality is to be found only in his benevolent
   application of them.
   Robert Owen's house in New Lanark.
   Robert Owen's house in New Lanark.

   For the next few years Owen's work at New Lanark continued to have a
   national and even a European significance. His schemes for the
   education of his workpeople attained to something like completion on
   the opening of the institution at New Lanark in 1816. He was a zealous
   supporter of the factory legislation resulting in the Factory Act of
   1819, which, however, greatly disappointed him. He had interviews and
   communications with the leading members of government, including the
   premier, Lord Liverpool, and with many of the rulers and leading
   statesmen of Europe.

   New principles were also adopted by Robert Owen in raising the standard
   of goods produced. Above each machinist's workplace, a cube with
   different coloured faces was installed. Depending on the quality of the
   work and the amount produced, a different colour was used. The worker
   then had some indication to others of his work's quality. The employee
   had an interest in working to his best. Though not in itself a great
   incentive, the conditions at New Lanark for the workers and their
   families were idyllic for the time.

   New Lanark itself became a much-frequented place of pilgrimage for
   social reformers, statesmen, and royal personages, including Nicholas,
   later emperor of Russia. According to the unanimous testimony of all
   who visited it, New Lanark appeared singularly good. The manners of the
   children, brought up under his system, were beautifully graceful,
   genial and unconstrained; health, plenty, and contentment prevailed;
   drunkenness was almost unknown, and illegitimacy occurred extremely
   rarely. The most perfect good feeling subsisted between Owen and his
   workers, and all the operations of the mill proceeded with the utmost
   smoothness and regularity. The business was a great commercial success.

Plans for alleviating poverty through Socialism (145243)

   Robert Owen is commemorated with this statue in Manchester.
   Robert Owen is commemorated with this statue in Manchester.

   Hitherto Owen's work had been that of a philanthropist. His first
   departure in socialism took place in 1817, and was embodied in a report
   communicated to the committee of the House of Commons on the Poor law.

   The general misery and stagnation of trade consequent on the
   termination of the Napoleonic Wars was engrossing the attention of the
   country. After tracing the special causes connected with the wars which
   had led to such a deplorable state of things, Owen pointed out that the
   permanent cause of distress was to be found in the competition of human
   labor with machinery, and that the only effective remedy was the united
   action of men, and the subordination of machinery.

   His proposals for the treatment of poverty were based on these
   principles. Communities of about twelve hundred persons each should be
   settled on quantities of land from 1000 to 1500 acres (4 to 6 km²), all
   living in one large building in the form of a square, with public
   kitchen and mess-rooms. Each family should have its own private
   apartments, and the entire care of the children till the age of three,
   after which they should be brought up by the community, their parents
   having access to them at meals and all other proper times.

   These communities might be established by individuals, by parishes, by
   counties, or by the state; in every case there should be effective
   supervision by duly qualified persons. Work, and the enjoyment of its
   results, should be in common. The size of his community was no doubt
   partly suggested by his village of New Lanark; and he soon proceeded to
   advocate such a scheme as the best form for the re-organization of
   society in general.

   In its fully developed form - and it cannot be said to have changed
   much during Owen's lifetime - it was as follows. He considered an
   association of from 500 to 3000 as the fit number for a good working
   community. While mainly agricultural, it should possess all the best
   machinery, should offer every variety of employment, and should, as far
   as possible, be self-contained. "As these townships" (as he also called
   them) "should increase in number, unions of them federatively united
   shall be formed in circles of tens, hundreds and thousands", till they
   should embrace the whole world in a common interest.

   In Revolution in the Mind and Practice of the Human Race, Owen asserts
   and reasserts that character is formed by a combination of Nature or
   God and the circumstances of the individual's experience. Owen provides
   little real prescriptive content beyond the need for all societies to
   recognize and implement his insights.

Community Experiment in America (1825)

   New Moral World, Owen's envisioned successor of New Harmony. Owenites
   fired bricks to build it, but construction never took place.
   New Moral World, Owen's envisioned successor of New Harmony. Owenites
   fired bricks to build it, but construction never took place.

   At last, in 1825, such an experiment was attempted under the direction
   of his disciple, Abram Combe, at Orbiston near Glasgow; and in the next
   year Owen himself commenced another at New Harmony, Indiana, U.S.A.
   After a trial of about two years both failed completely. Neither of
   them was a pauper experiment; but it must be said that the members were
   of the most motley description, many worthy people of the highest aims
   being mixed with viagrants, adventurers, and crotchety, wrongheaded
   enthusiasts, or in the words of Owen's son "a heterogeneous collection
   of radicals... honest latitudinarians, and lazy theorists, with a
   sprinkling of unprincipled sharpers thrown in."

   Josiah Warren, who was one of the participants in the New Harmony
   Society, asserted that community was doomed to failure due to a lack of
   individual sovereignty and private property. He says of the community:
   "We had a world in miniature — we had enacted the French revolution
   over again with despairing hearts instead of corpses as a result. ...It
   appeared that it was nature's own inherent law of diversity that had
   conquered us ...our "united interests" were directly at war with the
   individualities of persons and circumstances and the instinct of
   self-preservation..." (Periodical Letter II 1856) Warren's observations
   on the reasons for the community's failure led to the development of
   American individualist anarchism, of which he was its original
   theorist.

London

   After a long period of friction with William Allen and some of his
   other partners, Owen resigned all connection with New Lanark in 1828.
   On his return from America, he made London the centre of his activity.
   Most of his means having been sunk in the New Harmony experiment, he
   was no longer a flourishing capitalist but the head of a vigorous
   propaganda, in which socialism and secularism combined. One of the most
   interesting features of the movement at this period was the
   establishment in 1832 of an equitable labour exchange system in which
   exchange was effected by means of labour notes; this system superseded
   the usual means of exchange and middlemen. The London exchange lasted
   until 1833, and a Birmingham branch operated for only a few months
   until July 1833.

   The word "socialism" first became current in the discussions of the
   "Association of all Classes of all Nations," which Owen formed in 1835.
   During these years, his secularistic teaching gained such influence
   among the working classes as to give occasion for the statement in the
   Westminster Review (1839) that his principles were the actual creed of
   a great portion of them. His views on marriage were certainly lax
   enough to give ground for offense.

   At this period, some more communistic experiments were made, of which
   the most important were that at Ralahine, in County Clare, Ireland, and
   that at Tytherly in Hampshire. The former (1831) proved a remarkable
   success for three and a half years until the proprietor, having ruined
   himself by gambling, had to sell out. Tytherly, begun in 1839, failed
   absolutely.

   By 1846, the only permanent result of Owen's agitation, so zealously
   carried on by public meetings, pamphlets, periodicals, and occasional
   treatises, remained the co-operative movement, and for the time even
   that seemed to have utterly collapsed. In his later years, Owen became
   a firm believer in spiritualism. He died at his native town on 17
   November 1858.

Role in spiritualism

   It is alleged by the British Spiritualists' National Union that the
   Seven Principles of spiritualism were dictated by Robert Owen to the
   medium Emma Hardinge Britten. The support for his ideas amongst
   spiritualists and nonconformists led Owen to gradually alter his views
   on religion, and he embraced spiritualism towards the end of his life.
   This is mentioned through Gerard O'Hara's book "Dead Men's Embers".

Children

   Robert and Caroline Owen's first child died in infancy, but they had
   seven surviving children, four sons and three daughters: Robert Dale
   (born 1801), William (1802), Anne Caroline (1805), Jane Dale (1805),
   David Dale (1807), Richard Dale (1809) and Mary (1810).

   Owen's four sons, Robert Dale, William, David Dale and Richard, all
   became citizens of the United States. Anne Caroline and Mary (together
   with their mother, Caroline) died in the 1830s, after which Jane, the
   remaining daughter, joined her brothers in America, where she married
   Robert Fauntleroy.

   Robert Dale Owen, the eldest (1801-1877), was for long an able exponent
   in his adopted country of his father's doctrines. In 1836- 1839 and
   1851- 1852 he served as a member of the Indiana House of
   Representatives and in 1844- 1847 was a Representative in Congress,
   where he drafted the bill for the founding of the Smithsonian
   Institution. He was elected a member of the Indiana Constitutional
   Convention in 1850 and was instrumental in securing to widows and
   married women control of their property and the adoption of a common
   free school system. He later succeeded in passing a state law giving
   greater freedom in divorce. From 1853 to 1858, he was United States
   minister at Naples. He was a strong believer in spiritualism and was
   the author of two well-known books on the subject: Footfalls on the
   Boundary of Another World ( 1859) and The Debatable Land Between this
   World and the Next ( 1872).

   Owen's third son, David Dale Owen (1807-1860), was in 1839 appointed a
   United States geologist who made extensive surveys of the north-west,
   which were published by order of Congress.

   The youngest son, Richard Owen (1810-1890), became a professor of
   natural science at Nashville University.

Works by Owen

     * 1813. A New View Of Society, Essays on the Formation of Human
       Character. London.
     * 1815. Observations on the Effect of the Manufacturing System. 2nd
       edn, London.
     * 1817. Report to the Committee for the Relief of the Manufacturing
       Poor. In The Life of Robert Owen written by Himself, 2 vols,
       London, 1857-8.
     * 1818. Two memorials behalf of the working classes. In The Life of
       Robert Owen written by Himself, 2 vols, London, 1857-8.
     * 1819. An Address to the Master Manufacturers of Great Britain.
       Bolton.
     * 1821. Report to the County of Lanark of a Plan for relieving Public
       Distress. Glasgow: Glasgow University Press.
     * 1823. An Explanation of the Cause of Distress which pervades ihe
       civilized parts of the world. London.
     * 1830. Was one of the founders of the Grand National Consolidated
       Trade Union (GNCTU)
     * 1832. An Address to All Classes in the State. London.
     * 1849. The Revolution in the Mind and Practice of the Human Race.
       London.

   Robert Owen wrote numerous works about his system. Of these, the most
   highly regarded are:
     * the New View of Society
     * the Report communicated to the Committee on the Poor Law
     * the Book of the New Moral World
     * Revolution in the Mind and Practice of the Human Race

   The Robert Owen Collection, that includes papers and letters as well as
   copies of pamphlets and books by him and about him is deposited with
   the National Co-operative Archive, UK .

Works about Owen

   Biographies:
     * Life of Robert Owen written by himself (London, 1857)
     * Threading my Way, Twenty-seven Years of Autobiography, by Robert
       Dale Owen (London, 1874).

   There are also Lives of Owen by:
     * A. J. Booth (London, 1869)
     * W. L. Sergeant (London, 1860)
     * Lloyd Jones (London, 1889)
     * F. A. Packard (Philadelphia, 1866)
     * Frank Podmore (London, 1906)
     * G. D. H. Cole (London, Ernest Benn Ltd., 1925)

   Other:
     * Arthur Bestor, Backwoods Utopias, (University of Pennsylvania
       Press, 1950, second edition, 1970)
     * John F.C. Harrison, Quest for the New Moral World

   Robert Owen and the Owenites in Bittain and America (New York, 1969)
     * H. Simon, Robert Owen: sein Leben und seine Bedeutung für die
       Gegenwart (Jena, 1905)
     * E. Dolleans, Robert Owen (Paris, 1905)
     * G. J. Holyoake, History of Co-operation in England (London, 1906)
     * I. Donnachie, Robert Owen. Owen of New Lanark and New Harmony
       (2000)

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