Social Classes & Early Labor Movements: Post-French Revolution

Social Classes Post-French Revolution

The French Revolution introduced the equality of all citizens before the law, eliminating privileged classes. However, social classes emerged, grouping people according to their economic level. These included:

The Ruling Classes

• Nobility

  Derived its income from vast land holdings, increasing productivity and profit through the introduction of modern agricultural techniques.

• Upper Middle Class

  Engaged in industrial, commercial, banking, and agricultural enterprises, amassing great fortunes that rivaled the luxury of the old nobility.

The Middle Class

This class was formed by a diverse set of comerciantes (merchants). While their political positions were often close to the ruling classes, they were separated by voting rights tied to higher income. Despite this, they expressed differences in public regarding homeownership, education, and other social habits.

The Working Classes

• Peasants

  The countryside continued to house most of the population, living with very low levels of technical and cultural progress. Strong demographic growth and the Industrial Revolution led to a rural-to-urban exodus.

• The Proletariat

  Their numbers and composition grew as industries expanded in cities. Employees were not involved in property management or business decisions and were entirely dependent on the will of their employers.

Labor Movement Ideologies and Early Protests

The urban proletariat class was initially quite small, lacking political and economic power, and culturally impoverished without a clear ideological project. Their harsh living conditions, coupled with exclusion from political participation, encouraged the development of protest movements against low wages, excessive working hours, and a general lack of rights for the proletariat:

• Luddism: Machine Destruction

  A phenomenon characterized by the destruction of new machines introduced in factories.

• Chartism: Demand for Rights

  An exclusively British movement that demanded a "People's Charter" (a letter of law) for citizens, confident that universal suffrage would bring labor representatives to Parliament.