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Social class in regency england
Social class in regency england
Social class in regency england
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This fairly classless system changed, though, with the introduction of tobacco. Those with more land became richer, and part of a new upper class. They would hire indentured servants to work for them, and these indentured servants formed the lower class. Former indentured servants formed a sort of middle class. However, this class system was not unmoving.
Throughout England 's history, the main three social classes were royalty, nobility, and commoners. Over time, the center of power shifted from the higher classes down to the lower classes with documents such as the Magna Carta. This led to Parliament having two houses, the House of Lords for the nobles and the House of Commons for the commoners. The House of Lords was the higher and more powerful house at the time, although this changed in the 19th century when limitations were placed on their power. Their primary responsibility was checking bills passed by the House of Commons to make sure that they were not making a mistake.
There was a separation in classes which caused an unequal balance between rich and poor. As the revolution came to commence, the poorer classes felt mistreated by the wealthy and disliked them so they sided with the British and supported and fought for them instead of their own people. The wealthy and rich soon realized that they needed the lower classes to support them and they reasoned with them to gain their trust and support. They started economic policies to appeal to the lower classes and adapt their hold in the war. Zinn announces that the Founding Fathers wanted the lower classes to stay down and wanted to control the profits and economy of the government for their own benefits and appeal to only themselves.
This was mainly due to the capitalistic government where the economy was based on private owned industries. Bellamy’s idea of a more socialistic economy was favored more by the lower-class as it would have allowed the government to better allocate wealth which may close the gap between the upper-class and lower-class citizens. In Bellamy’s novel Dr. Leete, explains that everyone gets the same opportunity, same wages, and same education. The government distributes everything so that the citizens all get equal chances. The only difference between citizens is what he or she chooses to do with their resources (Bellamy).
Nearly all political systems in the 1700s were exclusively for elite and upper class individuals. Political participation was at all time life since the number of people who could and wanted to vote was extremely low. This was no longer the case. While some elitism and superiority of politics
Huthmacher conveys that liberalism of Americans made the type of political system they were wanting. He asserted that the government got involved because of how the lower class portrayed their rights and voted for legislation. The low class was looking for improvement for working conditions. He provided job security, better wages and working conditions, and gave some benefits of production to consumers. “As a result, we find urban lower-class representatives introducing a large variety of business regulatory measures on the local and state levels during the Progressive Era”(Huthmacher 13).
But the top class of the social class was Freemen, which were all male citizens. Then the class under that is, Metics which were outsiders that could not own land and run industries and businesses. Slaves were the lowest class that didn’t have rights
Furthermore, both the aristocrats and middle class were able to afford luxuries and could educate their children. Women of these classes were also not required to work but often watched over the affairs of the families plantations since the men were busy in government or other
The post-revolutionary war time was no different regarding class structure, and many people were in just as bad of a position as they were before. Fortunately, after a central government was established, the states slowly became more unified. The Bill of Rights ensured the people basic liberties, and the system of checks and balances prevented any one group from taking over the government. While the years after the American Revolution was difficult, the country that emerged from it is what was important in the end. After the members of the upper class acknowledged and addressed the problems facing the lower class, even if only to prevent further rebellion, everything began to improve.
The classical liberal ideas of changes to the class system impacted the 19th century society because it gave the owners of factories/mines more power to pursue economic freedom, private property, and self interest. With little government involvement stopping them. Before the Industrial Revolution the upper class were the nobles, the middle were the merchants, lawyers, and the clergy, then the lowest class were the peasant farmers. The class system changed with the Industrial Revolution, with the new working class and the nouveau riche. The nouveau riche was made up of wealthy factory/mine owners, bankers, and merchants.
Slowly, the public sphere soon includes the non-upper class as people like Thomas Payne and the Founding Fathers and essays like The Federalist Papers are written for and understood by the commoners. It was a bit of a shock to those in
The classes would include of the lower class, middle class and the most respected being nobility. For women these social classes were mainly set on by their husband or Dad. Lower class women typically worked as servants and were generally not respected by higher classes. Although they were treated poorly, they had important roles such as cleaning, cooking and taking care of the children. Middle class women had more open opportunities for education, they received more wealth and a healthier lifestyle.
Social class played a key role in the Elizabethan Age; without social hierarchy society would have fallen apart, the people did not know of anything else other than the role of classes. Each class had different situations of life, some were wealthy and had nice homes while others were poor and living off of the streets. The class rankings were given to each individual by situations such as birth, fame, wealth, and known skills(“Elizabethan Era.”). One could only move up a class by the Queen's approval, obtaining sudden wealth, going into debt, losing your job, and many other specific conditions(“Elizabethan Era - The Lost Colony.”). For instance, marriage between two people from separate classes could alter social class and was often frowned upon.
Social classes are a form of social stratification that refers to the existence of structured inequalities between individuals and groups in society. A social class is a group of people of comparable status, power and wealth which are usually classified as upper class, middle class, and lower class. For each class, there are some specific opportunities available that influence their social life. We can understand about the particularity of the chances through unequal distribution of these opportunities between individuals in social classes. In here belonging to a social class seems to be an obstacle for some individuals to obtain equal opportunity, unlike upper class people.
Class struggle is a conflict in a particular society or between a society which is caused by the lack of unity in one society and different perspective of a different group in a society. It is also called class conflict or class warfare. One social issue of a class struggle is the social inequality. According to study.com, Social inequality is an inequity of social class, award, opportunities, religion, position in the community, social status and at some other point respect in a group of society.