After reading this article you will learn about Robert Owen: 1. Life of Robert Owen 2. Political Ideas of Robert Owen 3. Contribution to the Socialist Movement.
Life of Robert Owen:
In the middle of May 1771 Robert Owen was born. His parents were so poor that they could not bear nominal expenses of his education. When other boys of his age spent their time and energy in reading and playing Owen went out in search of job to earn money. At the age of eleven he was apprenticed to a businessman.
The rest of his life was a record of phenomenal success in business. He then borrowed a meagre amount of money from his brother to open a shop for machinery parts required for cotton textile industry. Goddess of wealth blessed him.
At the age of twenty three he started a cotton textile factory on a partnership basis and he became its manager. This business brought for Owen both wealth and recognition. Within a short time Owen was elected the leader of the business community to which he belonged. He did not want to confine himself only in the business world.
He displayed increasingly his interest in the social problems. Just then he got an opportunity. There was a cotton mill at New Lanark. He purchased the entire cotton mill as well as the village where it was situated. He started to improve the lot of the village.
Robert Owen implemented certain welfare schemes and achieved success forthwith. This brought for him international success. In 1813 he wrote a series of essays entitled a New View of Society.
In 1817 he was requested by a Parliamentary Committee to prepare a report on the relief of the manufacturing poor and he did it.
In the report he analysed the economic and social conditions of machine production and he proposed plans to alleviate the sufferings of the poor. Owen, it is said, was a rational secularist.
He did not mingle religion with politics and welfare activities. He announced his view publicly and this offended many of his fellow industrialists and politicians. They used it for political gains. Though Owen was against religion he was not against Christian ethics and morality.
Robert Owen died in 1858 at the age of 87. The students of socialist thought still remember him for two reasons. One is, even being a big capitalist his heart wept for the suffering and toiling masses of the British industrial society. For the emancipation of the working class he tried heart and soul to build up a socialist society.
The other reason is he was the owner of vast amount of wealth and it is amazing that he spent the entire amount for the benefit of the working class and at the fag end of his life he became practically pennyless.
Political Ideas of Robert Owen:
1. Social Programmes and Performance:
Robert Owen was dumbfounded seeing the ugly, insanitary and impoverished conditions of New Lanark where there was a cotton mill which he purchased. The other mill towns were no better than New Lanark. But Owen was a man of different type.
The appalling conditions of the inhabitants of New Lanark pained his soft heart. The children above six had to work from six in the morning to seven in the evening.
The wages in the factory were miserably low. The low-paid wage earners were also cheated by local shopkeepers at every point. They had no education, no healthy environment. Diseases, drunkenness, degradation and debauchery were their all time companions. They were plunged from head to foot in poverty and debt. Death rate increased in astronomical proportions.
The situation was intolerable to Owen. He proceeded with strong determination to save the workers and villagers of New Lanark. Robert Owen was a socialist both in his mind and activities. He decided to convert New Lanark into a socialist model.
He had an apprehension that this small attempt may not help him to achieve his ambitious goal. But he was not worried. He believed that small is beautiful and every big project starts with the small.
So he began to implement his programmes. He reduced working hours, stopped employing children under ten, and introduced free primary education and relatively hygienic conditions, eliminated drunkenness and theft by persuasion and not by punishment.
Robert Owen was not a theoretical or declared socialist. But he showed that by improving the physical environment the health and mental conditions of the workers could be changed and production of the mill could be remarkably increased. This he achieved.
It was a miraculous success. Many criticisms and obstructions were thrown upon him but he overcame them with stone-like determination. In 1806 an acid test came to him. Government drastically cut the import of cotton and as a consequence all the mill owners closed the mills and retrenched the workers.
Robert Owen did not follow the path of the fellow industrialists which was quite uncommon in his days. Though he closed the mill, he retained all his employees and gave them wages. We do not know any other better socialist principle than this. After the crisis was over he introduced other socialist measures, such as old-age pension.
The activities of Owen drew the attention of various sections of society as well as government. Being requested by the government he submitted the Report to the Committee for the Relief of the Manufacturing Poor.
In this Report he mentioned that the immediate cause of the large scale distress among the workers was the depreciation of human labour.
This was due to the introduction of mechanism into the manufacture of objects. The rapid advancement of mechanism reduced the demand for labour. Labour power came to be cheap. This made their condition more miserable. Mechanism also dominated the labourers.
The capitalists were not interested in the psychological or social problems. Their main concern was profit. Impoverishment and degradation in all its forms took alarming shapes.
Robert Owen worked hard to get his different schemes implemented; he particularly wanted to stop the employment of children in all factories. On this issue he faced stiff opposition from other manufacturers, because child labour was remunerative to them.
With great difficulty he succeeded in obtaining the passage of the Factory Act of 1819, the first law in England to limit child working hours in the textile industry. This can be treated as a great success on the part of Owen.
He created a public opinion in favour of the abolition of child labour and being excessively pressurised by Owen and the people—government was forced to enact the law.
Robert Owen then launched an attack against the established church for keeping masses in poverty and superstition. Although Owen did not pronounce it publicly that religion was opium, by action he showed that. His objective was to save-the masses from the clutches of the church.
We have earlier said that he was a socialist, now we see that he was also a materialist. Robert Owen was convinced that both church and religion were squarely to be blamed for religious superstition.
Church was misguiding the common people and befooling them. So long church and religion were controlling or misguiding the general public no progress was possible. Both church or religion and capitalists would continue to exploit people. Owen’s assessment of church and religion was accepted by Marx.
2. Utopian Programmes:
Robert Owen was really a great benefactor of common people and philanthropist. He did not like to confine himself within the four walls of welfare activities. He planned to build up a new society where there would be no exploitation, no inequality and, finally, no antagonism. Owen said that millions of suffering people coul
d not be left to their fate, because in that case the result would be disastrous.
Robert Owen thought that since mechanism was the cause of depreciation of human labour, the progress of mechanism must be stopped. But according to Owen that would be an impractical suggestion.
The only practicable way open to the society to devise a plan which would provide security for the working classes against the vicissitudes of machine production.
Robert Owen proceeded to set up cooperative villages. All the able-bodied working men shall be employed.
One section of the working men shall work in industry to produce industrial goods and the other section shall be engaged in the agricultural sector. And when this scheme is fully implemented every cooperative village shall be self dependent and self-sufficient.
Every cooperative village would contain about 1,000 men and 1,200 acres of cultivable land would be allotted to every village. Ownership would be common. Production would be stored in a common store house and each will draw his necessaries from that store. Each village would have a common kitchen, common dining room and dormitory.
There would also be provision for worship and education. All members of the cooperative village irrespective of sex, age, and ability would be employed in various occupations such as farming, manufacturing and different establishments of the community. Wealth would be distributed according to ability and experience.
Every cooperative village or society would be self-sufficient in all respects. The internal administration of the cooperative village will be managed by the members on cooperative basis.
The raison d’etne of Owen was to make man completely self- dependent so that they do not fall to the prey of self-interest seeking persons. Throughout his life Owen fought for the elimination of poverty, unemployment, crime and exploitation and for that purpose he wanted to build up a communistic system of society.
He was somehow convinced that private property is the chief cause of social ulcer and in order to cure it the very system of private property is to be abolished. His cooperative society was fashioned in that light.
Robert Owen gave priority to education since he believed that only education could change the mind of man. Education would inculcate love of the community from the child’s earliest years.
Fellow-feeling, brotherhood and other traits of human character should be ingrained in the mind so that real community feeling can grow. For this purpose Owen wanted to set up a communist society.
Education, self- consciousness and financial stability, Owen believed, would remove the social evils such as illiteracy, drunkenness, diseases, debauchery. Communist way of life can save society from exploitation that was the firm belief of Robert Owen.
It is worthwhile to note that Owen wanted to change the mind of man and his character through the improvement of physical environment. Socialism, Owen believed, could do that.
He insisted upon augmentation of wealth as well as its proper distribution. Both would be left to the management of society. Private management in production and distribution would entail corruption and all sorts of inequality.
Once inequality takes final leave from society spontaneous development of personality would not be impossibility.
It was the intention of Owen to materialize the various programmes through comprehensive reforms. Owen himself believed that the workers were the real source of wealth and, if so, it was the primary duty of the industrialists to adopt measures for the improvement of the in economic condition.
That is, the owners of industry must give a share of profit to the workers. By doing this the capitalists will do their own benefit. But it is unfortunate that the capitalists took no notice of this.
By giving meagre wages the manufacturers put the severest assault on the purchasing power of the workers. Low purchasing power leads to the minimum consumption and this creates over-production.
Robert Owen argued to the capitalists that low level of wages was not profitable to them; rather it was the cause of their ruin.
It is also a self-defeating process. They should, for their own benefit, protect the interests of the workers and refrain themselves from exploitation. It was his pious hope that noble sense and rationality would ultimately prevail upon them.
The various programmes launched by Owen proved that he was a great critic of capitalism and a socialist. He admitted that there were inconsistencies in capitalism, but these were the products of ignorance and confusion.
Spread of education among the workers and dawn of rationality could function effectively in the removal of exploitation and other harmful consequences of industrialization, violent armed struggle or revolution was unnecessary.
Robert Owen was also not eager to convince his readers that he was a believer of class struggle. He was rather afraid of it. His insistence upon class collaboration reveals his love for utopianism.
He failed to realize that privileged and unprivileged would never cooperate to free the society from the curse of exploitation. Clear conception of human nature he never nurtured.
The communistic proposal of Owen was not received cordially by his countrymen, co-manufacturers and people in authority. Some exhibited lukewarm attitude to his efforts. The Report he submitted was also kept in abeyance.
Robert Owen was disheartened. He realized that the social and political structure of his country was not ripe for launching a comprehensive reform scheme. But Owen was a great dreamer and activist.
He was fully convinced of his own potentialities. In order to translate his dreams into reality Robert Owen went to America and purchased a 30,000 acre tract at the price of 150,000 dollars in the new state of Indiana.
There he started his experiments. He called the colony New Harmony. It was constructed in the model of New Lanark colony and he also intended to implement fully the communistic principles.
He made every effort to make New Harmony a grand success. But all his efforts were in vain. He recruited brilliant individuals for the implementation of the project. Maxey comments, “This was his mistake. There were too many brains in the colony and not enough brawn, too many brilliant individuals and not enough plodding co-operators”.
Discontent on theological and other issues began to brew within a short time. The whole New Harmony was divided into different warring factions. Owen gave in to the demands. The New Harmony no longer remained a united and cooperative society.
When Robert Owen accepted the contradictory demands of conflicting groups and factions that signalled the death of the communistic society. The New Harmony started in 1824 and its end came in 1827.
He wound up the project and returned to England in 1829 almost empty-handed. He spent four-fifths of his fortune behind the project of New Harmony. Everywhere the Utopian scheme of Owen met with failure. But he did not give up hope because he was optimistic.
He was a great dreamer and he liked to dream. He had unbound faith on rationality and good-will of man. He believed that the oppressor and the oppressed could live together; employer would sacrifice his profit motive to widen the benefit of the employees.
The collaboration and cooperation among all classes of people would be able to eliminate poverty, inequality, disease and debauchery.
This was Owen’s lofty idealism. His dreams and idealism were never translated into reality. As a philanthropist he was successful, but as a Utopian socialist his failure knew no bounds. In spite of the series of failures history remembers him. Why? We shall discuss this in our following section, i.e., Owen’s contribution to Utopian socialist thought.
Contribution of Robert Owen to th
e Social Movement:
Engels in his Socialism – Scientific and Utopian says that the new mode of production, created by Industrial Revolution, was the herding together of a homeless population in the worst quarters of the large towns, the loosening of all traditional moral bonds, of patriarchal subordination, of family relations, overwork especially of women and children and complete demoralisation of working class.
At this juncture, there came forward a reformer and a manufacturer.
Robert Owen adopted the teaching of materialist philosophers – that main character is the product, on the one hand, of heredity, on the other, of the environment of the individual during his life-time.
Needless to say that Owen supported the influence of environment. In the Industrial Revolution all other manufacturers saw the chaos and trouble and they utilized it as an opportunity of fishing in the troubled waters, but Owen saw in it the opportunity of putting into practice his favourite theory. He saw the chaos as an indication of a new era. He wanted to build up a new society out of it.
Robert Owen was an uncompromising fighter. He fought relentlessly for the emancipation of workers from exploitation. His fight was against all the evils of industrialization. How much sympathy he held for his men is quite evident from his gesture or behaviour meted out to them. Without depending upon what other industrialists would do Owen unilaterally adopted certain welfare and socialist measures and these incurred for him their displeasure.
The untiring efforts of Owen may only be compared with those of Marx and Engels. Owen, no doubt, was a big industrialist and he had accumulated a vast amount of wealth. But he spent the entire amount for the fructification of an ideal-socialism.
He did not succeed. But he was the forerunner of Marxian socialism. This is no small a contribution. Robert Owen was convinced that only mass education could ignite consciousness against exploitation.
So he insisted upon the spread of education and he wanted to inculcate education among the children. He set up schools. The Marxian socialists on this point are not at all different from him. Education is viewed as the foundation building factor of socialism. Owen once said, “The best governed state will be that which shall possess the best national system of education.”
Kolakowski, a noted interpreter of Marxian thought, makes the following observation on Owen’s contribution:
“Owen’s doctrine initiated a new phase of the British workers’ movement, in which it ceased to be merely an outburst of despair and became a systematic force which in the end brought about immense social changes. Moreover, his attack on capitalism and his plans for a new society contained enduring features although some of his ideas—for example, that of a labour and currency were soon discarded as they proved to be based on entirely false economic diagnoses”.
Every social movement in England was associated with the name of Owen. Even Marx admitted the importance and contribution of Owen to the socialist movement and that is why Marx sought his help to make International Working Men’s Association a success. Both Marx and Engels were profoundly influenced by Robert Owen.
When Engels was in England he contributed to Owen’s New Moral World. In several places of Capital—Marx points out Owen’s importance, specially his conception of social revolution.
In this respect Owen occupies a higher place than Saint-Simon. After his conversion to communism Robert Owen concentrated his attack upon the main obstacles which prevented the transformation of the bourgeois social order into a communist social order.
He was a hard-shelled materialist, and based his theories upon the idea that human character is the outcome of exterior influences, that man does not possess any innate ideas or qualities or moral sentiment or conscience and that none of these things are instilled into his mind by any kind of supernatural power.
“The fact is that conscience is just as much a manufacture as cotton or any material.” This observation has a far deeper significance than all the thoughts of ordinary non-historical materialists put together. Owen was also pioneer in many other activities, such as labour legislation and introduction of education for the children working in factories.
In spite of all these remarkable contributions Owen remained basically Utopian and his utopianism was the prime cause of his failure. His faith on class collaboration, reforms, appeal to big industrialists and other conciliatory moves as the modes of attaining socialism proved in his lifetime ineffective.
Anikin says, “Owen’s system is Utopian, and hence full of contradictions and inconsistencies.” He spent enough resources to implement his scheme, but even that was insufficient.
Apparently Owen’s utopianism was responsible for the failure of all his schemes. But we are to think the whole issue from a different perspective. Marx and Engels have claimed that their socialism is scientific.
Has that socialism succeeded? No. People, government and industrialists of Owen’s time were not prepared to walk on the road of socialism. Particularly the government and the capitalists were against socialism.
People were not prepared. Under the leadership of Lenin a “socialist” state was established in Russia. The Soviet Union disintegrated in 1991 and that brought about an end of socialism.
There are few socialist states in the present day world. Question is are they in Marxian model? Many still firmly believe that socialism is not the only system that can emancipate the people from oppression. Today capitalism has radically changed and so also people’s attitude. They think that emancipation from oppression may be possible through parliamentary procedure.