[[The Age of Capital]] by [[Eric Hobsbawm]]. On [[Industrial Revolution]], [[French Revolution]], [long 19th century](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_nineteenth_century) (1789-1914), # Summary Hobsbawm presents his **twin revolution** hypothesis; that the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution were two singular yet interconnected events in the European history. Along with this presentation, France and Britain (the birthplace of two revolutions) are two protagonists of the story. Their fate - similarities and divergences - is one major topic of the book, along with the analysis of the twin revolution's impact. Other countries - Prussia and the USA in particular - are mentioned as the twin revolution permeated all of Europe, but they make a minor appearance. This presentation is akin to the **mind-body dualism** of Europe. French Revolution and its social impact is the *mind*, whereas the industrial revolution and its economical impact is the *body*. The French Revolution, as a singular event, is much easier to delineate. The Industrial Revolution, much less so and its beginning (and especially its end) can only be declared post-hoc. The shared analysis between two is on *class* - especially the bourgeoise versus the proletariats. There's a bit of haziness here. Both the French and the industrial revolution are labeled as bourgeoise revolutions; However, the industrial revolution is truly the revolution of bourgeoise; whereas the French revolution is the revolution of the middle class[^distinction]. In the 1789, they were synonymous but by the 1848 they've diverged. Regardless, the articulation of different classes - aristocrats, bourgeois, the middle class, petit-bourgeoise, proletariats, and peasants - and how they lived through the era in question is insightful. Ex: The peasant class's inclination to side with the reactionaries rather than the revolutionaries. I'm amused by Hobsbawm's Marxist tendencies; with the middle class he stays neutral, but towards the utilitarians and political economists, he shows contempt. Two figures - [[Malthusianism|Malthus]] and Bentham (along with Ricardo and James Mill) - are singled out. Malthus provided the justification on why the poor must stay poor. Bentham's utilitarian apparatus gave a pretense of hyper-rationalism to justify either colonialism or harsh domestic policies. [^distinction]: See [[Bourgeoisie#Vs the middle class? the *tiers état* (third estate)]] for the middle class vs the bourgeoise distinction. # Part 1. Development ## (1) The World in the 1780s 1. the world was much smaller (population; known worlds) and larger (slower transportation). 2. overwhelmingly rural world. some urban centers existed but they weren't production centers; "the prosperity came from the countryside". 3. nature of agriculture. Physiocrats. three spheres of agriculture (the oversea colonies, agrarian serfdom, western rural society). 4. on western rural society and the rise of agricultural entrepreneurs. 5. proto-capitalists and industrialists vs the merchants who had the power. enlightenment. conservative view of history, even amongst the thinkers of enlightenment, with the "enlightened monarch" as the most natural phase of history. 6. on absolute monarchies. relationship between the middle class and the enlightened monarch. Violence in the autonomist movements (Americas, Belgium, Ireland) and international rivalry, especially between France and Britain. The French monarchy's inability to finance wars. 7. There are signs of European hegemony, but most of the world was either unconquered (Africa) or treated as equals (China) still. ## (2) The Industrial Revolution 1. Introduction to the [[Industrial Revolution]], Marking 1780s as when it “broke out”, with few other contenders (1760s). Britain possessed some advantages (commercial agriculture) but was behind in other ways (science and education) compared to other European nation. Preconditions for the industrial revolution being a) reward for scaling production and b) the world market. Challenges of trailblazing the industrial revolution as the latecomers can imitate Britain. Cotton and colonial expansions highlighted as the key British advantage. 2. Deep dive into cotton; slavery and cotton. Growth of British export, especially dominating Latin Americas and India (and disrupting the historical West-imports-East relationship). Cotton industry at inception focused on technological iteration and adoption (rather than revolution). “Domestic systems“ instead of fully-fledged factories dominated the scene. 3. Why Cotton? (1. no other industry hired as many, 2. transitive impact of cotton dwarfed everything 3. unlimited import of raw cotton allowed industry to grow). Beginning of social discontent. Fear of future of capitalism from (1. Boom-bust cycles, 2. Profit declining 3. shortage of profitable investment opportunities - another case of 2). Cotton industry matured in 1830s; profit came from scale and wage compression. Battle over the Corn Law, as agricultural protectionism was perceived as a barrier to lower the wage even further. 4. Capital-goods industry (iron, steel, coal). Steel has no immediate utility, other than war, unlike textiles. Discussions on coal, which had immediate utility as domestic fuels before the industrial revolution. Railways initially developed to aid coal mine and transportation took off and became the symbol of the industrial revolution. Capital accumulation and investment opportunities to foreign (which regularly defaulted) and railways (“railway mania”). 5. Agricultural Revolution (drastic increase in food production) was necessary precondition. Came from rationalization and expansion of cultivated areas; “enclosure movement”. De-ruralization supplied a large labor force for urbanization (there was population growth too, but de-ruralization was immediate). Labor discipline in the newly industrialized world (regular rhythm of labor vs seasonal farm work). Source of skilled labor (existing smiths) and capital (relatively easy; though hesitation from existing class to invest on a new industry) in the Britain. Government policy committing to business, minus agriculture. By the 1848, Britain was the “workshop of the world”. ## (3) The French Revolution 1. question of whether the french revolution was "one of many", which Hobsbawm refutes; war and debt as the major cause. constitutionalism more than democracy. general history of the year 1, with the fall of Bastille being the major symbol. Analysis of the moderates between radicals and conservatives. French Revolution's participants was unscarred by the memories of the French Revolution. Sansculottes, which Hobsbawm is a bit more empathetic towards than Doyle. 2. year 2 of the revolution; monarch / clerical backlash. Beginning of internationalism (cause for *all enslaved humanity*). Revolutionary war polarized everything; its defeat would be the defeat of the revolution, vice versa. Origin of the *total war*, though it wasn't articulated as a unique phenomenon from the revolutionary chaos. 3. Marxist interpretation of the French Revolution, "terror" as conservative propaganda; moderates of the revolution is lost to history. Inevitability of war (again, defeat of the war equated the defeat of the revolution; loss of nation akin to the "fate of Poland" was feared). Accomplishments of Jacobins, including the end of feudal rights without indemnity. 4. Thermidor as the end of the revolution. Everything afterwards; until 1870s - were "all attempts to maintain a bourgeois society while avoiding the double danger of the Jacobin democratic republic and the old regime". On French military (effectively funded the regime), rise of Napoleon. The myth of Napoleon, "gave ambition a personal name". Dual-contribution of Jacobin-Napoleon - "\[Jacobins\] anticipated: \[Napoleon\] carried out". However, the Jacobin legacy still lives on as the ideal revolution. ## (4) War 1. war between *powers* vs *systems*, which watered down over time. pro-revolutionary enlightenment intellectuals all over Europe, but foreign philo-Jacobinism contributed little. Anti-French peasant partisans. The French-British rivalry; with Britain being economically driven. Uninterrupted French triumph over land between 1794 ~ 1812 and their disastrous naval history, due to royalist officers deserting. Relative youth of the French generals compared to Prussians. 2. chronology of the battles; [continental system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_System). 3. rationalization of the European political maps (enclaves, personal states, dual sovereignty, ...) especially in Germany. Nationalism, without the 20th century connotation, was rationalization compared to the feudal boundaries. Spread of the French system (feudal abolishment, Napoleonic code). French system was seen as the superior political system, reforms were adopted by new French states but its enemies too (ex: Prussia). Transform of the political atmosphere, where the previous wars and revolutions were mere change in balance of power. 4. Wars were less brutal than the past (30 years war) or the future (20th century wars) "Military campaigns tended to be short and sharp". Human cost was heavy, but not heavy compared to say, a cholera outbreak. Financial cost was heavy; inconvertible bank-notes, devaluation, bankruptcies, and inflation followed. Astronomical increase in the state debt. Post-war Britain spent most of its tax revenue to service debt. Rise of financiers (Barings, Rothchild) and the war economy. Question of whether the war slowed down the economic growth of France and Britain. Yes for both; French industry was severely hampered. For Britain, "it was worth it" to maintain their global hegemony and market power. ## (5) Peace Congress of Vienna. Age of historic diplomats - (Talleyrand, Metternich, Castlereagh) Long peace of the 19th century outside the Crimean war and other bilateral wars. Five great powers - Russia, Britain, France, Austria, and Prussia. * **Britain** was the unipolar superpower in terms of industry, navy, and colonial reach. Maintained the naval trade hegemony and colonial stronghold in India. * **France** was readmitted as one of the great power, but its industry and population deteriorated and wouldn't be able to engage a major war. The specter of Jacobinism was too high for the state and the bourgeois moderates; no significant foreign intervention till the 1848. * **Russia** gained territories but conflict with the British over Turkey (the "Eastern Question") started. Balkans and Levant became the battlefield (Greek independence of 1829). The beginning of the Great Game, but no country was willing to go on a full scale war over this. * **Austria** was reluctantly considered a great power. However, It was still a conservative, reactionary state trying to hold together a multi-ethnic state. * **Prussia** was strengthened to create a buffer against France. It was admitted for the first time as one of the great powers, and this underestimation has greatly benefited Prussia. ## (6) Revolutions 1. Three major revolutionary waves (1820-4, 1830, 1848). 1820s - Greece (Philhellenism) and Latin American revolution (Simon Bolivar). 1830s - defeat of aristocratic by bourgeois power. Jacksonian democracy. 1848 had the biggest revolutionary wave. 2. French Revolution's model and patterns for all subsequent revolution with three archetypes - (1791 constitution, 1793 Jacobin constitution, post-Thermidorian Babeuf). Nuanced class distinctions between the moderate liberals, radical democratic, and socialists complicated the future revolutions. 3. the restoration period; no proletariat movement yet. Revolutionary ideas were spread via secret insurrectionary brotherhoods (*Carbonari*, *Decembrists*). Officers' brotherhoods with new non-aristocratic officers were liberal and became regular in Iberian and Latin American politics. Slow recognition of internationalism's infeasibility as many nations were in different stages of socio-industrial development. Moderate-radical split. 4. On common laborers - The question of mobilizing common people - Jacksonian Democracy (sans Southern slaves), Mexico (including Indians in their independence). Chartist movement and their political organizational failure. France's lack of industrial poor. Blanquist correctly identifying the future conflict as a war between the proletariats and the middle class (who are increasingly satisfied with the non-radical reforms). Middle class radicals were split between reform vs revolution. Petty-bourgeoises as a hesitant class. 5. On Peasantry; revolutionaries slowly realizing the need to win the peasant support, but in practice rarely done. Peasants were regularly against the local landlords but loyal to the faraway monarch. Political immaturity of peasants. 6. Revolutionary seeds - culture of mass protests outside the USA / Britain. Recognition of communist class struggle in the post aristocracy world. Standard Jacobin revolutionary playbook. Disdain of *elite putsch* style revolution outside Iberia. The role of *exile* in internationalism as all revolutionaries at least *knew* each other. ## (7) Nationalism 1. Initial spark of nationalism from Giuseppe Mazzini's *Young Italy* movement. Rise of revolutionary classes - discontent of lesser gentry (stuck between absolutism, foreigners, magnates) and educated (literate) middle/lower middle class. On Universities. The role of national languages, especially for prints. For the lower class, *religion* played bigger role than nationalism. Start of the 19th century migrations. Daniel O'Connell's Irish national movement. 2. Nationalism outside the the Europe - Greece as the first model for nationalism (Philhellenism). Analysis into Greek nationalism (Bishops and merchant being the core of the language). Boundary between the Greek and Balkan nationalism. Bolivar's pan-American ideal. Slav solidarity having conservative tendency as the Tsar is seen as the core. In Asia, modernization and Westernization must occur before "national conscience" can form. # Part 2. Results ## (8) Land 1. Land Reforms - (land commoditization, ease of transfer of ownership, transformed rural class). The end of feudalism. Price increase during the Napoleonic war and post-war depressions. 2. French situation - peasants were better off; thus less surplus of labor from village to towns, which slowed down the French industry. Freed peasants were squeezed; less well off. Land transfers still modest; Church estates, historically inefficient, started to be redistributed. 3. Freed serf, even though they had legal rights, had less real rights (and less well off). Peasants joining the counter-revolutionary forces. Vendée's Bourbonism. Peasant ideology that the king is benevolent but the local lords are corrupt - and political campaign of the left to win the peasants over time. 4. Colonialism and land reform - Algeria, India, and Ireland. Upheaval of local land-owning schemes by either private ownership or nationalization (James Mill's utilitarianism; Malthus' theory of rent). Despotism of utilitarian bureaucrats - Reminds me of [[Seeing like a State]]. 5. Lack of agricultural trade. De-industrialization of India and Ireland. Ranking of farmer welfare - America > France > England > Ireland. ## (9) Towards an Industrial World 1. boom and slumps starting to replace good-and-bad-harvests. Divergence between Britain and the rest (the 1848 revolutions would have different cadence); 3 major changes - demographic, communication, trades. 2. setbacks of 1815-30, but growth ever since. Continental industrialization lacked systems (regulation, capital, feudalism, guilds, ...) compared to Britain. On Railway investments. Rise of banking to fund investments. 3. The French Paradox - slow economic development, and never reached the industrialization akin to Britain, USA, or Germany. "The capitalist part of the French economy was a superstructure erected on the immovable base of the peasantry and petty-bourgeoisie" - Marxist framework. USA's unlimited growth and inventions. US's North-South distinction, which resolved by the civil war. Russia is economically negligible but has huge potential due to its population and landmass. Reflections on the trade system (UK being the "workshop of the world") - should other countries attempt to modernize, or be happy with the exchanges (raw resources to UK's manufactured goods). Shortage of coal hindered Southern European industrialization. The Egypt question (first non-western country attempted to modernize, but defeated by the West in 1839-41). ## (10) The Career Open to Talent 1. Time of opportunity. The concept of the *parvenu*, self-made man. Paris at the center of modern trend - fashion, restaurants (former chefs of nobility). Bourgeois-Aristocratic conflict - "What Manchester thinks today London will think tomorrow", anti-corn law league. Bourgeois Utilitarianism. 2. 4 career paths - business, education, the arts, war, war is unpopular after the post-Napoleonic long peace. Rise of education and bureaucracy with standardized examination. "examination was liberal but not democratic or egalitarian". \[classical\] Liberalism and bureaucracy - "it is an elementary error to believe that liberalism was hostile to bureaucracy. It was merely hostile to inefficient bureaucracy". 3. Post-revolution minorities, especially the Jews. the Jews were prepared to assimilate to bourgeois society, as they were already urbanized. More on middle class - property-franchise requirements, the meritocracy view of the middle class - "The middle-class was freely open to all. Those who failed to enter its gates therefore demonstrated a lack of personal intelligence, moral force, or energy which automatically condemned them". The dire condition of the proletariats and reconstructed social hierarchy. ## (11) The Labouring Poor 1. condition of the poor; "new entrepreneur entered upon his historic task of destroying the social and moral order". mass alcoholism, re-appearance of epidemics. 2. on rebellions. Malthusian / Ricardian theories justifying the existence of the poor. Question of the real income during the industrial revolution. 3. the labor movements. The birth of class consciousness, after 1830. Jacobinism. Union solidarity. 4. the labor movements being "a common front of all forces and tendencies representing the mainly urban laboring poor", not just proletariats. Rise of socialism as an intellectual framework. 5. Discrepancy between the "spectre of communism" and the actual organizational force. More of a movement than an organization. ## (12) Religion 1. Secularization of the masses. The French / American revolutions were the first secular European political revolutions (compared to say, the English revolution), which became the model for all subsequent revolutions. Some attempts for secular religion (cult of the supreme being, religion of humanity). Schoolteachers replacing the role of priests. Existing religions failed to accommodate the urbanization and the new proletariats; unions and other secular organizations captured them instead. 2. Rise of Islam (Africa, SE Asia, Wahhabism) and Sectarian Protestantism (esp. the US). 3. Role of religion to bourgeois (justification) and aristocracies (counter-revolutionary). Revival of Roman Catholicism (Naturalism). Protestantism and reformation seen as the direct precursors of the rationalism. ## (13) Secular 1. two major beliefs - belief in the progress vs against. Utilitarianism vs "Natural Rights". Progress being as natural as capitalism. Political Economy being a "dismal" science. More on Bentham and Rircardo. On practical liberals; constitutional monarchy with property suffrage over democracy; democracy and liberalism being seen more adversarial. 2. Socialism - its divergence from the classical liberal tradition. Evolutionary / Historically inevitable view of history. Socialism could've not been formulated without the social upheaval. 3. Conservative ideologies - unstructured, but a vague sense of "liberalism destroyed the social order". 4. Middle grounds - Rousseau's naturalism. Jeffersonian "state of small independent farmers". German classical philosophy. Young Hegelians. Classical economics post Smith/Ricardo stagnated; even [[John Stuart Mill]] wasn't as influential. ## (14) Arts 1. French Revolution's inspiration, Industrial Revolution's horror, and bourgeois society supporting the arts' existence. 2. Romanticism. Napoleon the myth-hero. 3. On Political Economy & Romanticism. Marx's upbringing of both the English political economy and German romanticism. Allure of the middle ages, the "primitive man". Romanticism of Asia, especially the Hindu Buddhist traditions. 4. On "the folk"; discovering the national identity. On romanticism and revolutionism and political inclination of the artists. Art for art's sake vs the humanity / nation / proletariat's sake. 5. Bourgeois imitating the aristocratic fashion. Dandy fashion. The middle class *biedermeier* style. More inclination towards the science / functionalism - Science and technology were the muses of the bourgeoise. 6. Common folks' art - bleak period as the industrial life didn't emerge till the 1870s. ## (15) Science 1. Supremacy of the French science. Private research / industry model of Britain. 2. Physical Science - electro-magnetism, advancements in chemistry, mathematics. 3. Social Sciences - political economy, "greatly exaggerated the universality of the postulates". Malthus, justification of poor remaining poor. Sociology, History, philology (which is evolutionary by nature). Other social science are primitive / nonexistent. 4. Biology and geology - their evolutionary nature was opposed by the conservatives; the general "theory of progress". Other sciences such as "the theory of race", which has the 20th century consequences. 5. science, natural philosophy, politics, and romanticism. analogies between science and prior structures. ## (16) Conclusion The age of superlatives, where all numerical measures either went up or down. people were aware that they are living in an era of change, but saw them as growing pains. population demographics (bourgeoise, the middle classes, the working classes). Inevitability of a revolution of some sort; the fear of stagnant future. # Topics ## [[Democracy and Liberalism]] ## The role of the moderates * [[Team of Rivals]] also discussed this; ## Nationalism & Internationalism The horrors of the 20th century categorized nationalism with the other -isms that caused the two world wars. However, I was surprised to learn that nationalism was initially a rationalizing movement. Right now, nationalism is synonymous with jingoism and is adjacent to the doctrines of racial supremacy. However, this wasn't always the case; nationalism was a call to unite under a *nation* instead of other grouping forces such as religion and empires. States under the feudal world was truly unreasonable - small lords, personal unions, mixed sovereignty imposed by the papacy and the Holy Roman Empire are few of the backwardness imposed to the notion of sovereign states. Against this model, *nation* is much rational model. 1. The agency is given to the people, as the people need to identify with the nation. Being part of an empire or a personal union is categorically rejected. 2. Nationalism sets a natural minimum and maximum size of a nation. Too small of a group wouldn't qualify as a nation, and too big of a group would have sub-nations which would be prone to their own nationalism. 3. Nationalism categorically rejects the mixed feudal sovereignty model. 4. Compared to the 20th century nationalism, it wasn't an exclusive ideology; The ideology was used to push for the German and Italian unification. ## France and Britain Unlike [[Vaclav Smil]] or [[Industrial Revolution - aVSI]]'s attribution to the availability of coal, Hobsbawm's explanation of why industrial revolution happened in England is based on capitalism and market. In that sense, it's still more *socio-economical* view of the world rather than *technological* one. ## Against Utilitarianism and Malthusianism > [!quote] On Utilitarian - [[#(8) Land]] > There is much to be said for the enlightened and systematic despotism of the utilitarian bureaucrats who built the British raj in this period. They brought peace, much development of public services, administrative efficiency, reliable law, and incorrupt governments at the higher levels. But economically they failed in the most sensational manner. Hobsbawm really shows his distaste towards utilitarianism and Malthusianism. In the chapter [[#(8) Land]], Hobsbawm describes the "utilitarian despots" of colonial India, imposing destructive policies with conviction that they're maximizing utility. Other upper-middle class moral justifications in the name of liberty (such as the anti-corn league) is criticized. > [!quote] On Malthus - [[#(15) Science]] > T. R. Malthus's *Essay on Population* was neither as original nor as compelling as its supporters claimed, in the enthusiasm of the discovery that ==somebody had proved that the poor must always remain poor==, and why generosity and benevolence must make them even poorer. Its importance lies not in its intellectual merits, which were moderate, but in the claims it staked for a scientific treatment of so very individual and capricious a group of decisions as the sexual ones, considered as a social phenomenon. On [[Malthusianism]], Hobsbawm points out that it gave the bourgeois the framework to prove why poor will necessarily stay poor. It also depersonalizes them into irrational and sexual beings. If they knew any better, they shouldn't be reproducing. But because they are, it shows their irrationality and/or lack of self-control, which feeds back into the justification of their poverty. ## Romanticism and Naturalism ## Serf Emancipation * emancipation without support just creates a large vulnerable and exploitable population. * very easy for other means (legal or economical) to kick in and maintain the old status quo. * Jim Crow; Russian Serfs under debt;