The Social Classes in Europe - UPSC PDF Download

Integration of Landlords and Peasants into Capitalist Economy

• In much of Europe, landed property still remained the principal form of wealth in the first half of the nineteenth century, and landlords continued to exercise political power. The, hangover become integrated into the growing capitalism in agriculture and industry, and the social and economic basis of their dominance was transformed.
• This fact will be underlined in our next Unit on the transition to class society. Here we will see how exactly this dominance was exercised, and eventually challenged by the new classes in capitalist society.

Landed Classes in England

• The landed classes in England were the first to adapt their economy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, benefiting greatly from increased foreign trade, agriculture, and expansion in the textile, mining, and shipbuilding industries. The English landed aristocracy, which owned about one-fourth of all the land in the country, was the primary beneficiary of these economic changes. As a result, they had the power to shape agrarian change, economic policy, and early capitalist investment more than other European countries. The political victory of the landowning gentry in the "Glorious Revolution" after the English Civil War and the 18th-century land enclosures further facilitated the integration of the landed aristocracy into the capitalist economy and bourgeois society.
• The transformation of the landed aristocracy into modern landlords was accompanied by a change in the social composition of the landed gentry, with the commercial and industrial bourgeoisie increasingly investing in land. The law of succession and primogeniture in England made the landed element more open-ended. The integration of the aristocracy into the capitalist economy and their diversified ventures led to a gradual decline in their traditional patterns of political institutions, social norms, and values. Through the corrupt electoral system, a small number of families controlled a significant portion of seats in the House of Commons and ensured a decisive role for the House of Lords, which they fully dominated.
• However, between 1671 and 1831, English landowners' exclusive legal right to hunt game animals and the exclusion of wealthy merchants and the poor from this privilege began to erode their influence. The agitation for the repeal of Corn Laws, the Chartist movement, and the successive Reform Acts of 1832, 1866, and 1882 further weakened the landed gentry's power. It was not until the 1880s that the declining wealth and political influence of the landed gentry became more apparent.

Landed Classes in France

• In France, the nobility was divided into two main groups: the nobles of the sword, who enjoyed privileges stemming from military service, and the nobles of the robe, who gained their titles through serving in the bureaucracy or purchasing them. Some members of the French nobility were also part of the Court nobility, which held the highest offices in the bureaucracy, the church, and the army until the eve of the Revolution. There was a significant difference between these nobles and those based in the provinces, but all nobles, regardless of their status, continued to enjoy feudal privileges long after the commercialization of agriculture, growth of international trade and commerce, and the emergence of a well-entrenched bourgeoisie.
• Unlike the English or East German landed aristocracy, the French nobility did not exert its dominance through control over land or by modernizing agriculture. Instead, it sought to increase its revenues in a changing world by reasserting its old feudal dues. As a result, when the Revolution came, the French nobility had not transformed its basis of dominance and found itself in a weaker economic position compared to its counterparts in other countries. The French nobility eventually regained its preeminence with the Restoration, but its basis and forms of dominance were not as well integrated into the capitalist economy.
• Due to the French nobility's less integrated relationship with the capitalist economy, its forms of dominance were more varied, often linked to the Court and service, especially during periods that combined constitutionalism with monarchy. This distinction set the French nobility apart from the Continental nobilities, who maintained their dominance well into the twentieth century. Despite these differences, the nobility in both cases continued to play a significant role in their respective societies and economies.

Landed Classes in Eastern Europe

• The East European landed aristocracy was even more complex in nature. In Prussia, the position of the Junkers became much stronger with the capitalist transformation of agriculture, particularly as they were clearly linked to more authoritarian political structures after the unification of Germany. 
• The landed class was more open ended in the western regions than in East Germany, and the forms of its integration into the capitalist economy and social structure were also different, although there is a need not to exaggerate this aspect in the light of new research. In the eastern region the landlords were employers of wage labour in a more widespread form, while in the west their income derived primarily from rent. 
• However, throughout Germany, the continued dominance of the landed classes in the army, the bureaucracy and in the institutions of political life was much more visible and pronounced well into the twentieth century, long after the English and French landed classes had conceded their pre-eminence to the bourgeoisie. 
• Well integrated into the world market, the Junkers were able to hold their own in the capitalist world economy, as well as to influence state policies in their favour, particularly through protective tariffs. The voting pattern ensured their political dominance over the nation and in their localities.

Landed Classes in Central Europe

• In Central Europe, the landed aristocracy maintained much of their feudal nature, particularly as agriculture remained the main economic sector. Polish and German landlords were often found outside their national boundaries, defending the status quo and resisting nationalist aspirations in these regions. In Russia, the 18th century saw the formation of a new nobility, as Peter the Great linked state service with social status and reinforced the institution of serfdom. This created a unified and vested interest in perpetuating feudal systems of dominance, which were distinct from those in Western Europe and Germany. The Russian aristocracy managed to maintain their social, political, and economic dominance up until the 1917 revolution due to the manner in which agrarian reforms were implemented and the prevention of significant political reform.
• However, this is not to say that the foundation of the aristocracy's dominance remained static. They began to employ wage labor, collected ground rent, and became more directly integrated into the market, which affected their relationship with the peasantry. Additionally, their exclusive rights to land ownership were abolished. The dissolution of landed estates and distribution of land to the peasantry marked the end of the aristocracy's preeminence in both social and political spheres. Landlordism in Russia ultimately disappeared with the destruction of capitalism, a development that did not occur in other parts of Europe until after World War II, and only then in Eastern Europe.
• In the rest of Europe, landlords continued to hold a position of privilege and remained as the 'elites' of Western European societies. Although they may not have been as preeminent as they once were, their influence and status ensured their continued presence in the social and political landscape of the region.

The Peasantry in Europe

• The peasantry in Europe, as it existed in the pre-industrial era, disappeared due to the agrarian changes in the 18th and 19th centuries. However, peasants and landlords remained an essential part of European society, as the number of people engaged in agriculture didn't significantly decline until the mechanization of the 1940s. The situation of the peasantry and their integration into modern class society were determined by factors such as land settlements, market forces, and the development of capitalism in their respective countries. The relationship between peasants and landlords was often antagonistic but could also converge in opposition to policies favoring industry.
• The development of capitalism and modern class society led to the breakup of peasant societies and the differentiation of the peasantry into various classes, ranging from the peasant petty bourgeoisie to the rural proletariat. The peasantry's social attitudes and political allegiances were primarily determined by their assets and their need to adapt to the changes brought by market forces and capitalism. In France, the peasantry that supported the 1789 revolution became differentiated and integrated into post-revolutionary political structures. Similarly, in Germany, peasants continued to survive and prosper, even near industrial centers, through an agrarian capitalism that led to the commercialization of peasant agriculture and class conflicts within the peasantry.
• In summary, the peasantry in Europe underwent significant changes due to the development of capitalism, market forces, and land settlements. This led to the differentiation of the peasantry into various classes and their integration into modern class society. Rural conflicts became subsumed into the broader dichotomy of Capital and Labour, even as peasant agriculture persisted and landlords remained a privileged stratum of European society.

The Bourgeoisie

• The second half of the nineteenth century can be characterised as the age of the bourgeoisie in Western Europe, although in the eastern parts the bourgeoisie having attained its own identity, and wealth, was yet to exert its hegemony. In those countries where industrialisation was early and rapid-England, France, Belgium and the Netherlands, Switzerland, Scandinavia- its success was clear and not so tortuous.
• In Germany and Italy it was slower because of the initial slower transformation of the economic and social structures. In Russia, Austria, Hungary, Poland, and Spain the persistence of feudal tenures and in some cases autocratic political structures hindered its rise to power and its consolidation as a class was slower and less effective. In Russia it was to be over thrown before it could successfully challenge the dominance of the landed gentry. 
• In general throughout Western Europe the wealthiest and the most influential sections of the bourgeoisie were now bankers, factory owners and mine owners, i.e. capitalists, particularly after die 1850’s. The merchants lost their eminence as their class gained hegemony. Commercial bourgeoisie was not the same as the old merchants. It became multifaceted, including within its sphere of identity economic and social linkages with varied economic functions.
• It invested in urban property and land, participated as actors on tire political stage. The industrial bourgeoisie was no more confined to the earlier journeymen or owners of small manufacturies whose rise to eminence and wealth depended on the slow accumulation of capital from below. 
• Their sources of income generation included finance and banking, a result of the merger of industrial and banking capital, and the identical interests of finance, banking and the cartelisation and monopolies in economy. 
• It was the ruling class, of equal standing with the landlords. As industrial wealth became the index of social advance, the middle class in general became more influential. It became common throughout Europe for wealthy men of middle classes to spend fortunes buying great estates, adopting the manners of the aristocracy, even as the landed classes began investing in urban property.
• The virtues of the capitalist ethos-individualism, thrift, hard work, competition, use of money power, family, were values basically promoted by this class, and came to dominate industrial society as a whole. The bourgeoisie also included the professional salaried component that grew with the growth of bureaucracies, the sectors of health and medicine, law and order, education, publishing, printing and mass media, and culture as an industry, with a new system of patronage linked to mass production.
• All of these were characterised by a democratis;itioi: that contributed to their expansion, and an inequality that created the hegemony of the bourgeoisie as a class through them. The higher and the more lucrative positions were held by members of the wealthy strata among the bourgeoisie, and sections of the landed aristocracy separated fiom land income.
• This entire bourgeoisie shared a critical distance from the landed aristocracy and the monarchies in their countries as they grew in strength and significance, and despite the clear differentiation among themselves were united in their opposition to privilege and despotism, and then increasingly even more so from the working classes when challenged as the ruling class. Simultaneously they became part of a composite elite along with the landed gentry in turn increasingly ‘bourgeoisfied’ as we enter into the 20th century.
• Everywhere they gave shape to the particularities of nationalism in specific periods and specific areas. With the expansion of education into the 20th century there was infiltration into these positions at the middle level by ‘commoners’ among the middle classes that contributed members to radical politics throughout Europe, Russia being the outstanding example. Social democracy and the women’s movement, which questioned the status quo, were born as a result of these.
• The timing of these different stages varied, beginning with England, France, and then Germany, followed by Eastern Europe. The process in Germany and Russia, being later was also faster, more compressed, and the short period of identity formation also entailed relative, if not great homogeneity of the industrial bourgeoisie, and less differentiation between the industrial bourgeoisie and other sections of this class.
• In the more backward regions of Europe, particularly in Poland, the Czech and Slovak areas, Hungary and even in Russia, the owners of capital, entrepreneurs and managers were often foreign nationals: sometimes Germans and Jews of another area. The bourgeoisie across Europe had differing religious affiliations, Catholic, Protestant, under strong Evangelical influence etc.
• In Russia the intelligentsia formed a section of the landed aristocracy/bourgeoisie uprooted from its class affiliations in terms of political ideology, in fact to a very great extent opposed to the very system of capitalism which contributed to its birth and growth.

Lower Middle Classes

• The lower middle classes formed a definable component of the modem class society, whose numbers increased rapidly with the expansion of services of various kinds under capitalism. Retailing, marketing, distribution, banking and finance - all increased in scale and complexity. The result was greater bureaucratisation of the manufacturing sector as well, and with the expansion of education of schoolteachers, mainly women here. 
• The lower middle class, though highly stratified, can be divided into two main groups - the classic petty bourgeoisie of shopkeepers and small businessmen, and the new white-collar salaried occupations, mostly clerks but also commercial travellers, schoolteachers, and certain shop assistants. The most dramatic increase was among white-collar employees like clerks, sales people, secretaries, and low ranking bureaucrats. 
• In Britain by 1911, 42 percent of all commercial clerks were employed in manufacturing. In the period 1882 to 1907 salary earners rose from 7.0 to 13.1 percent of the labour force, while the Employees category in France rose from 772,000 and 5 percent of the workforce in 1876 to 1,869,000 and 9.3 percent of the work force in 1911. In Russia too with the rapid pace of industialisation there was a considerable increase in their numbers. 
• The most immediate feature of these two different groups was in their strikingly different market situations, although in subjective terms they often came to see themselves together at least in some ways. 
• To begin with, they did not see themselves as working class, and were particular about maintaining this distinction and underlining the non manual nature of their work. The second element drawing together these two groups was that they shared a similar position of marginalisation in relation to the bourgeoisie. 
• Their status was precarious in relation to other groups. Their greatest fear was that economic adversity would force them back to their working class origins, which they made every effort to distance themselves from. The other -side of the need for job security was the fear of the sack, particularly in the times of the down swing in economy. 
• They stood for the broad features of the capitalist economy, strongly defended the right to private property and their goals were to aspire to bourgeois status and climb higher in the social ladder. They did not agitate to overthrow the bourgeois social order or to challenge the right to private property, even as they suffered the consequences of increasing concentration of production and trade, and lost out badly in the ensuing competition. In the labour market too their situation was precarious. 
• As the lower middle classes operated in a local context their actual social experience tended to make them find individual rather than collective solutions to their problems. In the course of their work and every day life they also came into contact with a wider range of social groups than the working class. Their class consciousness was, therefore far less developed than that of the working classes or the bourgeoisie and they acted collectively to a much lesser degree, the case of Germany being a bit exceptional in this regard. 
• In terms of jobs railways and post offices which had very large networks and were impersonal were the exceptions. It was to some extent a result of their status consciousness and disdain for the working classes as well. The local context of their operations also made them less open to change, less able to cope with change and in many ways more conservative politically and in terms of culture than the bourgeoisie.
• This strata of society was particularly vulnerable in Britain, as much due to their inability to mobilise politically as to the nature of the British political structure, the House of Lords, the nature of politics in the lower house and Parliament as the main vehicle through which political change was effected in Britain. The sense of individualism was also far more developed in Britain than on the Continent.

The Working Classes

• The dichotomy of capital and labour determined the character of the working classes of Europe. The composition and experience of the working classes was quite varied. Industrialisation may have reduced the barriers between the landed classes and the wealthy middle classes, but it sharpened the differences between the middle class and the labouring sections. This is one of the reasons for their emerging as a political and social class despite their varied composition.
• The city and social life reflected the strong division of the rich and the poor. They had different spaces in the city to live in, and the amenities and the facilities were quite different, very much as it is in our country today. By the end of the nineteenth century new construction techniques began to change the face of the cities. Multistoried apartments and office buildings came up.
• Sewers, sidewalks and electric lights, cafes and department stores, parks and boulevards, concert halls, public libraries, all changed the picture of industrial towns as smoky, crowded, dirty tenements with chimneys as dominant part of landscape. But all this was for the rich, as were the drives to suburban dwellings owned by them. The labouring poor had their crowded one-room dwellings in which two or three families may live, taking shifts to sleep, little sanitation, poor transportation and great insecurities.
• While the railways and new seaside resorts changed the concept of leisure for the well to do, the only trips made by the poor were in the course of their migrations for means of livelihood. The lower class activities like fairs, cock fighting, pubs etc. began to be looked down upon by the former commoners, now the privileged middle classes.
• Throughout Europe the working class remained stratified and differentiated well into the 20th century as mechanisation did not come all of a sudden and not to all the industries at the same time. Within the cities there were skilled artisans who saw their pre-industrial skills replaced by machines, others who prospered in the first half of the century as mechanisation in another process created greater demand for their product.
• The classic example is the disjunction between nieclianisation in the spinning and the weaving processes in the earlier stages of industrialisation Some of the skilled trades remained at a premium long after mechanisation. Other skilled jobs emerged precisely out of large-scale industries.
• Skilled craftsmen, domestic workers, tailors, laundrymen, print workers, masons and other construction workers, post and telegraph workers, railway men in a variety of jobs, miners, and unskilled and skilled factory workers coexisted in all cities. New additions in the form of former peasants came with the growth of factories on a widespread scale to complement second and third generation workers. 
• In Russia particularly the peasant link remained strong and contributed hugely to the militant character of the working class movement there. Women and children contributed a new dimension to the composition of the working class. There were distinct variations in living styles and wages, giving rise to a labour aristocracy. 
• Till the 1850's factory workers were still a minority in the work force even in England, after which their numbers grew' rapidly. The pace of increase in their numbers was complementary to the fast pace of industrialisation in the countries that industrialised later. In France the skilled craftsperson retained greater significance for a longer period. The industrial revolution destroyed the traditional world of the new factory worker. 
• The new worker was now entirely dependent on a cash wage, subjected to a totally different work rhythm dictated by the factory discipline and the machine. Working conditions were terrible, often hazardous. Cut off from the security and larger family they felt extreme dislocation and alienation. Social life for them centered on the pubs and cheap cafes. Women and children were largely employed for unskilled tasks, in equally appalling conditions, because lower wages could be given to them. 
• Unemployment was a dreaded reality. At a general level the new industrial working class bore t he brunt of the early industrial growlh. There are innumerable descriptions of the working conditions and working class which point towards misery, long hours of work (15-16 hours, later 12 hours), unending grind and terrible behaviour by the supervisors, all of which industrialisation in its earlier stages meant for the working class, and led tca series of spontaneous worker riots in the early decades of the nineteenth century.
• Later as w'ages improved with legislation and expansion of the industrial economy, and as a result of the unequal economic relationship with the colonies, the working class became aware of the dichotomy of Capital and Labour, and of the contradiction between themselves and their employ ers, which gave rise to a variety of class expressions.

Political Consciousness

• Class experiences gave rise to class-consciousness on the part of the different sections of society, which was expressed through differing political affiliations. Throughout Europe the landed classes struggled against the loss of their preeminence through a variety of political formations-Agrarian League in Germany. The House of Lords in England, the United Nobility in Russia, and so on. 
• Apart from that they supported right wing parties, Church Parties, and all forms of protectionist policies favouring agriculture They also came to terms with the trappings of democracy seeking to defend their interests through democratic institutions and practices. The peasantry, contrary to the popular perception of them as uniformly conserv ative, gav e strong evidence ofprotest against immediate and local factors. 
• They also had a variety of organisations, and expressed their interests through the use of and demand for education and other facilities. In Russia they demanded all that and became an inseparable part of the revolutionary' movement. The bourgeoisie expressed its political consciousness initially through representing the general demands of society against privilege and despotism. Increasingly it began to give specific form and content to its class interests through promoting economic policies opposed to agriculture and landed aristocracy and through gaining dominance in the representative institutions. 
• Although ideologically it stood by liberalism, in practice it supported and initiated centrist and right wing parties as well to counter the working class pressure. You would read more about it in the chapter dealing with the state and political formations. The working people were the first to challenge the capitalist order. Theirs is a storv that began with food riots and machine breaking and evolved mio varied forms of organised protests that assumed great political significance. Working class protests were sometimes a response to the immediate conditions of life. 
• At other times they were part of a genera! revolutionary social unrest, and implied changes in political structures and state forms They formed trade unions and the trade union movement grew well into the 20th century. With the growth of socialist ideas the working class movement also became linked with social democracy and gave support to the social democratic parties. In Russia the working class movement played a major role in overthrowing the capitalist order.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the transition to modern class society in Europe was marked by significant transformations in the roles and relationships between the landed aristocracy, peasantry, bourgeoisie, and lower middle classes. The integration of landlords and peasants into the capitalist economy led to the emergence of new class structures and diverse patterns of social and political behavior. The bourgeoisie rose to prominence, shaping the economic, cultural, and political landscape, while the lower middle class struggled to find its place in the new social order. The different trajectories of these classes across Europe were influenced by factors such as the pace of industrialization, political contexts, and the development of capitalism in agriculture and other sectors. Despite these variations, some generalizations can be made regarding the nature of social classes and their evolution during this pivotal period in European history.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) of The Social Classes in Europe

How did the transition to modern class society affect the landed aristocracy in England?

The transition to modern class society led to the transformation of the English landed aristocracy into modern landlords who derived their wealth from capitalist ground rent and other diversified ventures rooted in capitalism. Their dominance in political institutions and social norms and values began to decline as capitalism took hold in society.

What factors contributed to the differentiation and class formation within the peasantry in Europe?

Capital accumulation in the countryside, erosion of communal rights, and commercialization of peasant agriculture led to significant class formation within the peasantry in most areas of Europe. This resulted in the peasantry being divided into classes ranging from the peasant petty bourgeoisie to the rural proletariat.

How did the bourgeoisie establish itself as the ruling class in Western Europe?

The bourgeoisie gained influence and wealth due to the expansion of industry, commerce, and finance, which allowed them to invest in urban property and land. As industrial wealth became the index of social advance, the middle class in general became more influential, and the bourgeoisie came to share power with the landed gentry as part of a composite elite.

What were the characteristics of the lower middle classes in Europe?

The lower middle classes were highly stratified and can be divided into two main groups: the classic petty bourgeoisie of shopkeepers and small businessmen, and the new white-collar salaried occupations, such as clerks, commercial travellers, schoolteachers, and certain shop assistants. They were characterized by their non-manual work, marginalization in relation to the bourgeoisie, and aspirations to climb higher in the social ladder.

How did the lower middle classes respond to the challenges posed by capitalism and industrialization in Europe?

The lower middle classes sought individual rather than collective solutions to their problems, as they were more focused on maintaining their distinct status from the working class and aspiring to bourgeois status. They generally supported the capitalist economy, the right to private property, and the existing social order, even as they faced competition and job insecurity due to the concentration of production and trade.