Changing Attitudes Towards Poverty: Gustave Dore, Houndsditch (1872) Wentworth Street, Whitechapel...
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Transcript of Changing Attitudes Towards Poverty: Gustave Dore, Houndsditch (1872) Wentworth Street, Whitechapel...
Changing Attitudes Towards Poverty:
Gustave Dore, Houndsditch (1872) Wentworth Street, Whitechapel (1872)
Investigators
• Booth: founder of Salvation army
• Andrew Mearns: ‘The bitter Cry of Outcast London
• http://www.attackingthedevil.co.uk/related/outcast.php
• GR Sims: report on the poor in London
Charles Booth
• Wealthy Liverpool ship owner
• Began investigation to disprove the claim that a quarter of Londoners lived in poverty
• Over 1 million families investigated
'Map Showing Degrees of Poverty in London for 1889-1890',
Booth’s classification of the people he interviewed:
A (0.9% in poverty)
The Lowest class-occasional labourers,loafers and semi-criminals
B
(7.5% in poverty)
The very poor-casual labour, hand to mouth existence, chronic want
C and D
(22.3%
In poverty)
The poor-including those who have small earnings because of irregular employment or poor pay
E and F
(51.5%
In comfort)
The regularly employed and fair paid working class
Charles Booth
• Shocked to discover that figures were actually underestimated
• 30% living below ‘poverty line’
• But only 10% been helped by Poor law
Bluegate Fields (1872)
Seebohm Rowntree
• Wealthy York manufacturing family
• Aim: to see if the level of poverty in York was different to london
• 1901 published Poverty, A study of Town Life
Nestle Rowntree
Key findings
• Identified two types of poverty:
• Primary poverty, those people whose earnings were so low they could not survive on them alone
• Secondary Poverty: those who had enough to live on but spent money
Key findings
• Determined poverty line at 21s 8d (£1.08)
• Found York had 27.8% of its population living in poverty
• Poverty was not always the fault of the person e.g. low wages, sick, elderly
Significance
• Both investigators used new methods to study poverty
• Charity was not enough, the government would have to provide help
• Greater awareness of poverty
Pressures
• Employers e.g Rowntree, Lever, Brunner believed there was a need for action
• Politicians: increasing number ready to support state action
• Extension of the franchise to working class men (1867 and 1884)
Pressures
• Growth of the labour and socialist societies
• E.g. Fabian society: Sidney and Beatrice webb
Boer war:
• The British consolidated their power over most of the colonies of South Africa in 1879 after the Anglo-Zulu War.
• The Boers protested and in December 1880 they revolted.
• Boer: is the Dutch word for farmer
First Boer War (1880–1881)
the Second Boer War (1899–1902)
Boer women and children in a concentration camp
Boer war:
• many men unfit to fight• In Manchester 8,000 volunteered but only
1200 were accepted• up to 40% of recruits were unfit for
military service, suffering from medical problems such as rickets and other poverty-related illnesses.
Overall
• For all these reasons there was a gradual shift from self help and hard work attitude towards a ‘collectivist’ belief in social reform
• Activity
• What were the main causes of Poverty in the late nineteenth century
• Describe the work of Charles Booth and Seebohm Rowntree in changing attitudes to poverty in the early twentieth century