Robert Owen and Utopian Socialism
Biography of the Socialist who Started Utopian Communities
May 21, 2009
Robert Owen could be described as a man before his time. When other industrialists were exploiting workers, even children under 10, Owen conducted a social experiment at New Lanark mill, based on his fervent belief that , by treating workers fairly and educating them, a new society would emerge where there was no poverty, and universal love would prevail. The author is indebted for much of the material in this article to the New Lanark Conservation Trust and information supplied at the visitors centre at New Lanark, Scotland.
Robert Owen’s Early Life
Owen was born in Newtown, Wales in 1771. His formal schooling ended at age 7 and at age 10 he was apprenticed to a Scottish draper in Stamford, Lincolnshire. He was treated as a son and made use of his employer’s library to further educate himself. He later moved to Satterfield’s wholesale drapery in Manchester, where he stayed till he was 18, and obviously acquired a great deal of trade knowledge and business acumen.
Robert Owen’s First Business Ventures
Owen borrowed money from his brother and started a business partnership manufacturing cotton spinning machines, widely known as ‘spinning mules’. He sold out of this business just three months later and joined two Scots, McConnell and Kennedy, in a yarn-spinning factory.
Owens clearly had a sense for business and a drive to succeed. While still a teenager, he applied for the position of manager of Drinkwater’s Bank Top Mill in Manchester and asked for a salary of 100 pounds per year. He proved himself by commanding a team of 500 workers, and managing the entire process from buying raw materials to production.
The Formative Influences on Owen the Reformer
Owens’ intelligence and thirst for knowledge was astonishing. At 22, he was a member of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, a group of local intellectuals, where he was inspired by the works of Rousseau, Bentham and Wollstonecraft. He contributed papers to the Society which reflect the vision he was forming for a new society. For example ,‘The Connection between Universal Happiness and Practical Mechanics.’
On a business trip to Glasgow, Robert Owen met Caroline Dale, and was invited to visit her industrialist father’s newest venture, the New Lanark Cotton Mills. David Dale was himself a religious philanthropist and had built New Lanark partly with a view to providing employment for the destitute Highlanders ‘cleared’ from their crofts.
Owen’s Purchase of New Lanark
In 1799, Owen both married Dale’s daughter and, with partners, bought his mill at New Lanark, and set up his home with Caroline at New Lanark in 1800. Again, it says much about Owen’s style of management that he chose to live in close proximity to his workers.
The mill returned good profits but his partners were dissatisfied that Owen poured potentially larger profits into improving social conditions for his workers, providing free medical care, a village store, street cleaning services, and an education system. Moreover, he banned the employment of children under 10 as unpaid apprentices.
Owen’s Reforms in Full Swing
In December 1813, Owen managed to buy out his opponents, replacing them with like-minded investors who included philosopher Jeremy Bentham. The new partners had agreed to take only 5% return, and allow surplus profits to be used for education and social improvement. Owens had prevailed and his brainchild the New Institution for the Formation of Character was opened on 1st January 1816.
The Development of Utopian Socialism and New Harmony
Owen was keen to extend his theories to create utopian collectives – Villages of Unity and Mutual Co-operation. In 1825, Owen sold out to his partners and devoted himself to social reform and the realization of his utopian dream. He moved to America and established a settlement called New Harmony with his 4 sons and a motley collection of participants. Within 2 years, the experiment had failed.
It is possible that Owen underestimated the importance of the employer-employee relationship of the New Lanark community and the strict rules he was able to apply to mould the lives of his workers. Owen was one of the first to discover that Communism does not translate well from theory to practice. Several other attempts to found model communities in Scotland, Ireland, Europe and America foundered.
Owen’s Legacy to the World
Although the utopian experiment failed, Owen became a champion for better working conditions and was for a time the leader of the working class movement. He was instrumental in establishing the Grand National Consolidated Trades Union and in 1832 established the National Equitable Labour Exchange. He campaigned for an 8 hour day, pioneered infant childcare in Britain, and, with his village store, was the father of the Co-operative Movement .
In his declining years, Owen lost support and was sometimes seen as having gone mad. He died in 1858 in Newtown, Wales, where he was born.
Sources:
New Lanark Conservation Trust, The Story of Robert Owen , 3rd Edition, 2007 ISBN 0-9522531-5-1
Also, historical information taken from informative signage on site around New Lanark Mill
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