The principal purpose of these notes is to correct certain misunderstandings which I believe to be widely prevalent concerning the character of British Trade Unionism during the quarter of a century which followed the establishment in 1850—1851 of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers. The period covered thus begins with the inauguration of the 'new model' type of Amalgamated Society, and extends to the end of the trade boom of the early seventies, stopping just short of the Great Depression which set in about 1875.
These letters of Varlin addressed to Albert Richard show Eugène Varlin first and foremost as the precursor of French syndicalism.Between the years 1868–1870 a great development took place in the French labour movement of which Varlin was the heart and soul as well the brains. He saw the great advantage of labour having its own organs for propaganda and founded a short-lived weekly le Travail; the Marseillaise, a daily paper for which he asked Richard's support took its place.Notwithstanding the financial hardships entailed on the workers, he welcomed, in a sense, the numerous strikes, because they were a sure means of compelling the workers to organise. "We must be ready with our organisation against the day of the revolution. It is essential that we shall be able at once to replace existing institutions by a more perfect system of our own; it will fetch all the doubters." He mentions the advisability of enlisting the bakers' union in the general strike movement. "For a general strike to be successful, it is imperative to have them with us."
The author of this article on the activities of the Hungarian refugee and spy Johann Bangya based himself on archival sources hitherto unused. As early as 1845/46 Banya had already occasionally served the Austrian Government in some confidential capacity. A spy in the grand style, however, he became after the collapse of the Hungarian fight for independence of 1848/49. He succeeded in establishing himself among the London circles of emigrants, and it was he who put the authorities on the track of the "Kommunistenbund" in Germany. The arrest of the emissary Nothjung and the Cologne Communist Trial, moreover, may be traced back to him as well. Bangya managed to get into close contact with Marx and he smuggled the former's polemic pamphlet Die grossen Männer des Exils into the hands of the police. Marx subsequently accused him of theft of this manuscript and denounced him as a spy in the New York Criminal-Zeitung of May the 3rd, 1853.
The great strike movement in France in the summer of 1936, which took its peculiar form of action in a series of stay-in strikes, can only be explained by the general state of mind of the French working-class in the spring of 1936. France had found itself for the last two years in a state of growing social and political fermentation. The danger of the militant social and political reaction, which manifested itself particularly clearly in February 1934, had roused the socially and politically progressive elements in France and enabled the reconciliation of the two great labour parties. It also surmounted the discord in the trade-unions and led to the formation of the "Popular Front", which gained a glorious victory at the elections of deputies on April 26th and May 3rd 1936. In the course of this development of events the social consciousness of the working-class was strengthened. The feeling no longer to have to accept meekly the privations they had had to suffer during the years of depression, and no longer to stand deprived of their rights by their employers, gradually grew stronger. The beginning of 1936 marked a tremendous growth of the membership in the trade-unions and everywhere in the working-class there was a state of ferment. Characteristic of this development is, above all, the fact that in the beginning of the movement of 1936 the material claims, the claims for raising wages, often played a less prominent part and fell back behind the aspiration for mitigation of the social inferiority of the working-class, that is to say, the actual acknowledgement of the workman's right to join a trade-union, the realization of the system of collective contracts, the admittance of representatives of the workers in the different industries.
The Vienna Labour-Chamber has for ten years examined the budgets of 60—70 families of workers, employees, unemployed and small annuitants. This decade comprises both the gradual recovery of Austria's economic position from the crisis caused by the war and the inflation, and part of the crisis which began in 1929.In 1925, out of 42 heads of households 2 were unemployed, in 1928, out of 62 none, in 1934 on the other hand 19 out of 69. The average sum of annual expenses in 1925 amounted to 3.703, in 1929 to 5.105, and in 1934 to 3.208 schillings per family; the income of the heads of households in 1934 amounted to only 62.2 % of that of 1926. Efforts on the part of other members of the family to make up for the decrease in the income of the head of the household by taking up work proved unsuccessful.The housing conditions show an improvement till the year 1930, which is expressed in a diminuation of overcrowding; from then onwards the conditions remain rather stable with a slight tendency towards deterioration. Rents, which show a considerable rise whilst still remaining fairly low owing to the Act for the protection of Lessees, account in 1925 for 2.62 %, and in 1934 for 7.26 % of the total expenditure.Partly as a result of the small expenditure on rent, the percentage of the household expenses spent on food is very considerable. In 1925 it amounts to 59.73 %, in 1931 (the minimum year) to 48.17 % and in 1934 to 50.64 %. The biggest item of the expenditure for food is meat, the consumption of which is more or less directly affected by the business cycle, whereas the consumption of bread and flour is hardly influenced at all. The consumption of fats shows great fluctuations in its composition; the principal constituent, however, remains always lard.
The aim of the author of this article was merely to write an introduction, i.e. to offer some observations on the methods and theories appropriate, in his opinion, to the study of the Christian Syndicalist Movement.In part I he deals with the organisations' internal life. Here he examines in turn:The circumstances of the organisations' foundation, namely partly clerical and doctrinal influences, partly the reactions of the workers. The various ways in which Christian Trade-Unionism is influenced by the clergy. The structure of the confederations, especially the problems of centralism and bureaucracy, democracy and federalism. And finally recruiting-conditions, viz. the degree of confessionalism of the organisation, the religious attitude of the members as a whole, and the distrubution both geographically and vocationally. Here he adds a comparison between the fluctuations in the number of members of Christian and of socialist organisations.
The exceptional interest of Benbow's pamphlet Grand National Holiday and Congress of the Productive Classes has already been stressed by Beer1), Crook2) and Dolléans3) who quote extensive passages.What they communicate, however, does not seem to make a complete reprint of this pamphlet superfluous. Benbow's writings derive their importance not only from their showing us one of the most striking facets of the so many-sided social thinking in the England of the beginning of the nineteenth century, but also, and not least, from their being the first written theory about the general strike. These two considerations justify a reproduction of a pamphlet which is difficult of access to those interested, and certainly so outside England4).
The present study with pauperism, its causes, its prevention and its significance for the social evolution on the West-European continent, endeavours to provide for one of the gaps which social history, seen as a science of the social dynamics prevailing in history, brings to light. The Rhine-territory here is presented as an exceptionally suggestive illustration.This investigation shows that both the social associations which the age of pauperism called up in defence against the distress of the masses, and the revolutionary tendencies are a determinant factor in the birth of the modem type of workman, as well as in the origin of the great West-European labour-organisations of the second half of the nineteenth century (trade-unions, cooperations and parties). The shaping of the Farmers'- and the Artisans'-Movement, particularly in Germany, is decisively influenced by them. This evolution of social associations means for the ruling classes the first attempt at neutralising the inner social tensions of the system of industrial capitalism.Thus the age of pauperism and associations is a period of preparation, of great social-historical importance, without insight into which the later social evolution — upon which our times are based — can be understood and explained in but a very imperfect manner. The investigation of this period again shows the necessity of regarding social history as in independant part of the discipline of the discipline of the social sciences.
