Economic Liberalism, Class Society, and the Rise of Labor Movements

Economic Liberalism

Adam Smith

• Job was the only source of wealth
• Personal interest is in the interest of the community
• Law of supply and demand
• Maximum individual initiative
• Exchange (free trade)

Class Society

Public Sector Management (disappearance of privileges, the rise of the bourgeoisie, and the onset of the proletariat).

Workers' Movement

Labor Conditions: Workers had no holidays or social security (for medical care or to cover leave). Workers were forbidden to join for the improvement of their status.

Trade Unions

Associations of workers of the same trade who were seeking better working and living conditions.

Syndicalism

Labor unions were associated with improvements in working conditions.

Utopian Socialism

Opposing ideological currents to capitalism that sought to attain state intervention in the economy to improve conditions for workers.

Marxism

Political and Economic Theory

• Its main figures were Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
• In its tactics, Marxist ideology advocated a change in the economic, social, and political systems through class struggle
• In their social organization, the working class ought to confront the bourgeoisie, to achieve its disappearance and seize power to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat. A classless society had no oppressors or oppressed.

Anarchism

Theory

• Joseph Proudhon and Mikhail Bakunin
• It was opposed to any form of government, since the government is only the echo of coercion and a supposed injustice.
• It defended individual freedom in self-sufficient communes where there is no private property and where there is no kind of authority.

The International Workers

It arose in the 1860s when labor leaders from various European countries raised the need to associate in order to have more strength in their claims. The objective was to create a solid atmosphere between workers.

First International

It disappeared soon because of the persecution it suffered from the governments of the countries where it was established. Marxists wanted to participate in political life through political parties. Anarchists were expelled through the anarchist unions.

Second International

Its main vindication was to achieve an 8-hour workday and it established May 1st as a day of protest. It also soon disappeared due to the rising political tension that existed in Europe, which led to the First World War.

National Assembly

Represents the people or nation and not a particular establishment.