A potpourri of notes
Of course the expansion you mention followed the ending of the Corn Laws in 1846 and the consequent removal of tariff protection. However, according to Classical theory, Rents and land prices would then rise swallowing much of the increase in production.
That seemed to have happened. As you know the beginnings of modern welfare came in at the turn of the century. Also, the Georgist inspired Liberal Program of taxing land values came to the forefront - along the way knocking down the power of the House of Lords. Had it succeeded - it was close - perhaps the relatively few people who now own most of England would have been joined by the millions of present landless.
As Cobden (leader of the Anti-Corn Law League) said: "He who will free the land will do more for England than we who have freed commerce." (Quoted by Churchill.)
I've heard arguments that here in the 19th century USA education that was doing very well in communities was replaced by the regimented methods you mention.
Finally, does China have a patent system. I know that western trading partners keep pressure on her to recognize intellectual property - but is it effective in practice.
I know dozens of Chinese web sites where pretty much any "cracked" software can be obtained. I use the best file manager I've come across and I got it from a Chinese programmer. My son, Alan, found it first and used it in Chinese. He prevailed on the young lad to turn out an English edition - which he did. As you might not expect - the name of the file-manager is X-File (American culture is everywhere). It is freeware.
If the Chinese leave these youngsters alone, if they are allowed to have their 19th century, I think we can expect great things from them.
Harry
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Keith wrote:
Hi Mike,
At 19:27 10/10/02 -0600, you wrote:
>Hi Keith,
>This was, of course, the period of Britain's decline :-)
>Mike
You will have your fun!
We have to be careful about dates here. Here is the period (the 1830s-40s)
in the words of Adrian Desmond and James Moore:
"England is tumbling towards anarchy, with countryside unrest and riots.
The gutter press are fizzing, fire bombs flying. The shout on the streets
is for revolution. . . . a million socialists are castigating marriage,
capitalism and the fat, corrupt Established Church."
At the same time, according to Engels, the working man had "the most
extravagant expectations of prosperity."
By the time of the Reform Bill of 1867, Socialism had been re-established
as strongly as ever before in English history, the London Trades Council
had been formed, and street corner oratory was disturbing the peace of
bishops in their palaces.
And now, so help us, the working man was actually educating himself!!!!!
By the 1870s the authorities had had enough. The working man was now
relatively peaceful but he was also trying to better himself! If the
working man was going to continue to want his children to be educated then
somehow it all had to be deflected into safe channels in some way. As the
historian A. L. Morton put it: " . . the workers were [now] showing a
disturbing tendency to educate themselves, and there was no guarantee that
this self-education would not develop along subversive lines."
And the best way to prevent all that was to start free state schools and
attract children away from the Church Schools and the many other charitable
schools that were actually threatening to start sending working class
children to new universities. So that's what the authorities did from 1870
and onwards. While Germany and others countries (particularly America) were
expanding their school systems, building technical and engineering schools
and widening the curriculum, England simplified the curriculum, confining
it to the basic three R's only* and, by dint of teachers spending a lot of
their time marching children backwards and forwards in the "playgrounds"
like army platoons, produced biddable factory work forces or household
servants for the middle and upper classes. (*Even so, the standard of
reading, writing and arithmetic learned by Victorian children of 10 or 11
years of age was higher than now achieved in state schools.)
So, after a period of unparalleled economic expansion from about 1840 -
1880, in which almost everybody benefited -- the working man as much as
anybody -- the upper classes moved the goal posts and re-established its
control by means of a new meritocratic civil service (the entrance
examinations of which had nothing to do with engineering or chemistry or
science, of course, but only of the "best" subjects, such as Latin, Greek,
and Ancient History), dethroned Manchester and reinstated London as the
main centre of influence, invented 99% of the ceremonials of government
(children are taught today that these ceremonials are "centuries old"!!),
expanded the British Empire, and generally started to despise industry
which had made the country so financially powerful.
Because America did not despise industry it came through both World Wars
financially and economically stronger than it went into them, whereas
England was bankrupted both times.
America still doesn't despise industry, but tomorrow's world will depend
upon skills which are far more advanced than those required in traditional
industry, and unfortunately (from most accounts I'm reading on the Net)
America now has the English Disease of IDDSS (increasingly dumbed down
state schools). This is why China is probably going to wipe the floor with
America in the next couple of decades unless a revolution can occur in the
classroom.
Keith
>> (*Everything that I've read recently about the growth of private schools in
>> China -- and of the excitement and dedication of the pupils towards
>> learning -- is strongly reminiscent of mid-19th century England before the
>> dead hand of the state fell upon schools and universities. At that time,
>> mechanics and miners' institutes teaching everything from classical Greek
>> to Engineering were springing up in every city and many small towns, new
>> municipal universites were starting (e.g. Birmingham), most parents were
>> paying for their children to go to school, public lectures on science were
>> vastly oversubscribed, private and municipal libraries were springing up
>> everywhere, etc. It was chaotic but vastly exciting.
--------------
Keith Hudson
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