Work and Revolution in France: The Language of Labor from the Old Regime to 1848

by William H. Sewell Jr

Work and Revolution in France is particularly appropriate for students of French history interested in the crucial revolutions that took place in 1789, 1830, and 1848. Sewell has reconstructed the artisans' world from the corporate communities of the old regime, through the revolutions in 1789 and 1830, to the socialist experiments of 1848. Research has revealed that the most important class struggles took place in craft workshops, not in 'dark satanic mills'. In the 1830s and 1840s, workers combined the collectivism of the corporate guild tradition with the egalitarianism of the revolutionary tradition, producing a distinct artisan form of socialism and class consciousness that climaxed in the Parisian Revolution of 1848. The book follows artisans into their everyday experience of work, fellowship, and struggles and places their history in the context of wider political, economic, and social developments. Sewell analyzes the 'language of labor' in the broadest sense, dealing not only with what the workers and others wrote and said about labour but with the whole range of institutional conventions, economic practices, social struggles, ritual gestures, customs, and actions that gave the workers' world a comprehensive shape.

Genres: History, France, Sociology, Labor, 19th Century, European History, Nonfiction

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1980

Reviews

[Will · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sewell notes the threads tying the French labourers of 1848 with the artisans of the old regime by analysing the French labour force through a cultural lens. During the years covered in the book, "themes and sentiments originating in the prerevolutionary corporate system remained central to workers' consciousness and experience" (2).

What changed was the way in which the workers used their language identity in relation to the world around them. The post-revolutionary growth of individualism turned the corporations into enemies of the state, and expressing a collective identity became a form of resistance. This led the artisans to become labourers, the socialist proletariat of the post-1848 period.

One difference I would have liked to have seen is more emphasis on material affairs and their affect upon the French workers' views on the world. How did the growing impoverishment of the artisans in the face of capital development come into play here?

Quotes:

1.
“This book traces the organizations and the ideologies of French workers from the old regime to the Revolution of 1848. It seeks to demonstrate that themes and sentiments originating in the prerevolutionary corporate system remained central to workers' consciousness and experience through all the changes of this remarkably turbulent era. In spite of three major revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848), ten changes of constitution, and the onset of the industrial revolution, there were important continuities in the way French workers perceived, and acted in, the world.” (2)

2.
“The meaning of corporate phrases or institutions was inevitably altered by changes in the surrounding society. This history, consequently, pays as close attention to what divides as to what unites the subordinate journeyman of the prerevolutionary corporations, the sans-culotte of 1793, and the socialist worker of 1848.” (2)


3.
“Although economic forces and changes must retain a central role in labor history, they should be treated as continuous with all other aspects of workers' experience. Processes of production and exchange, like all other social processes, are subject to conceptual limits and symbolic definitions, and their outcomes must be evaluated according to culturally specific standards. To treat economic experiences in this way is not to deny their importance. Quite the contrary, it is to capture them as experiences, as being construed by those who lived through them, as having meanings that need to be recovered.” (11)

4.
“Workers shared the political, religious, and social language of the day and could not help but be influenced by the ideals proclaimed by the current political regime. Even when they opposed their employers or the state, their opposition was necessarily expressed in terms that their opponents could understand; the bitterest of battles bear witness to the workers' engagement in a common, if contested, frame of discourse.” (13)

5.
“Although the consciousness and the actions of workers must always be understood in the context of a changing larger society, we must also be attentive to what is particular about their version of the disputed world they inhabited. Their views, ideals, and judgments were never just a lower-level recapitulation of the values endorsed by the state and the dominant classes, nor were they ever a simple negation of those values. In all their successive organizations and ideologies, there were certain continuities of substance and tone - a consistent moral collectivism, an assertion of their own capacity to preserve order and pursue the common good, an insistence on the distinct value and identity of the various trades, and a pride in their work as a contribution to the public welfare.” (13)

[Grub Street Hack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Work & Revolution in France is a history on labor during the revolutionary era in France. It seeks to trace “the organizations and the ideologies of French workers from the old regime to the Revolution of 1848.” Sewell also claims, on several occasions, that his work contrasts mainstream historiography by concentrating on the 1848 workers’ revolution.

Sewell primarily focuses on two major arguments in his book: That the Artisans of the first half of the 19th century consistently held a corporatist view that can be traced back to the old regime, and that the emergence of the concepts of socialism and class-consciousness stem from the struggles of the 19th century workers. Overall, Sewell made convincing arguments regarding the tendencies of workers to coalesce into (what he labeled as) corporations for the intent of mutual protection, and for the emergence of socialist ideas in France.

Sewell describes workers as central to the 1830 July revolution, fighting troops with cries of Vive la Liberté!” The contemporary newspaper L’Artisan, which was founded by and written for workers with the goal of establishing “workers as legitimate actors and speakers in the public arena,” described labor as the property of workers, therefore brandishing workers with language they needed to wrest “their humanity from a new bourgeois aristocracy.” The discourse used by the writers of L’Artisan demonstrates a class consciousness had existed in early nineteenth century France.

Sewell claims to be a “new social historian,” which is a historian that uses the quantitative data from specific locations that has been thoroughly analyzed in order to reach more broad conclusions. Much of the data used is retrieved from several studies, but does include some original research conducted by the author. Consequently, Sewell refers to his work as a “synthetic essay.” Sewell also claims that cultural anthropology has influenced him by shaping his focus to discover the “symbolic forms” used by workers in order to understand their world. This is demonstrated through Sewell’s attempt to draw conclusions through the rhetoric of 19th century laborers.

[Armistead B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic if dry history of French Labor from the ancien regime to 1848. If that's what you want, that's what you'll get. An interesting read.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very sensible interpretation of early French labor history.

Sewell stresses continuity between the guilds of the old regime and labor organizations of the early nineteenth century. The corporate consciousness of prerevolutionary masters and journeymen, he argues, never completely disappeared. Neither the Enlightenment with its theories of free trade and individual property, nor Jacobinism with its singleminded allegiance to the nation, managed to eradicate the solidarity of the trade guilds or compagnies. The mindset of mid-nineteenth century workers, therefore, had much more in common with that of their eighteenth century forebears than most scholars have noticed. The French Revolution, however, did provide workers with a tradition of criticism and activism, particularly with regard to the nature and rights of property.

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comme je l'ai mentionné précédemment, les parties du magnétoscope se salissent au fil du temps. La plupart des pièces dans le magnétoscope qui ont besoin de nettoyage sont les parties qui entrent en contact avec la bande vidéo elle-même. La saleté peut venir à partir de bandes sales, la poussière et du lubrifiant accumulé dans le magnétoscope et la combinaison pour faire une masse gluante, ou peut-être vous n'avez pas supprimer tous ce que le beurre d'arachide et sandwich gelée. L'accumulation de petites particules de ruban "poussière" magnétique peut également être un problème. Bandes de location de films sont un cauchemar pour le magnétoscope, comme beaucoup de locataires ne sont pas prudents avec eux. Le nettoyage de votre magnétoscope sur une base régulière peut aider à le garder hors de la boutique.