The Condition of the Working Class in England

A collective noun designating the affluent aristocratic and upper-middle classes, which took ownership of all means of production during the process of industrialization. The term is most often used in conjunction with “proletariat” when discussing communist theories about class struggle.

An economic system in which the means of production (factories, mills, plants) are owned by private individuals or small groups rather than the government. In such a system product prices and wages are determined by competition in a free (global) market. Capitalist societies as they emerged in late 18th-century Europe became divided into two main classes: the bourgeoisie, or property holders, and the proletariat, or wage workers.

Two main problems of the capitalist system are identified in Engels’s book: the exploitation of workers by manufacturers and the production of surplus, which periodically causes economic crisis.

A political movement among the British working class that sought social change through constitutional means. It was inspired by The People’s Charter, an 1838 bill demanding major parliamentary reforms, such as suffrage for all adult men. Chartists relied on popular support in the form of petitions and meetings to pressure politicians without resorting to violence. In 1848 their largest ever petition was presented to Parliament but was rejected, initiating the movement’s slow decline.