CHAPTER XIII - THE UNITED KINGDOM AND ITS WORLD-WIDE INTERESTS

Summary

Between 1830 and 1870 the internal development of the United Kingdom passed through two phases, dividing roughly at 1850. By the middle of the century Great Britain (but not Ireland) had been transformed from a society that was predominantly rural and agricultural to one predominantly urban and industrial. In the first two decades social and political conflicts arose between the landed and agricultural interest on one hand and the growing commercial and industrial interests on the other. They arose over such issues as the reform of the electoral and parliamentary system, reorganisation of poor relief and of municipal government, free trade and factory legislation. The decades 1830–50 also saw the rise and temporary failure of such working-class movements as Chartism and trade unionism, born of the growth of industrialism during these years. By the time of the Great Exhibition of 1851, it was clear that at almost every point the commercial and industrial interests had gained what they wanted, and that the efforts of the working classes to claim that freedom of action and association which the rising class of merchants and manufacturers succeeded in claiming for themselves, had been severely checked. The two decades after 1851 brought consolidation and extension of the advantages gained by the new ruling classes; a remarkable growth of overseas trade and investment as well as of total national wealth; and a multitude of legislative measures adjusting the political and administrative system to the needs of the new society of towns and factories.