Robert Owen’s Experiment at New Lanark
From Paternalism to Socialism
Authors: Siméon, Ophélie
- Assesses how Robert Owen transformed New Lanark into a test-bed for his social philosophiesProvides the first attempt to trace the origins of 'Owenism' from a social history perspective
- Utilises previously unpublished archival material
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- About this book
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This book provides an account of how, in the years 1800-1825, enlightened entrepreneur and budding reformer Robert Owen used his cotton mill village of New Lanark, Scotland, as a test-bed for a set of political intuitions which would later form the bedrock of early socialism in Britain. Drawing from previously unpublished archival sources, this study shows that New Lanark was not merely on the receiving end of Owen’s innovative brand of industrial paternalism, but also acted as a major source of inspiration for many aspects of his social system, including his desire to remodel society along communitarian lines. This book therefore reaffirms the centrality of New Lanark as the cradle of socialism in Britain, and provides a contextualised, social history of Owen’s ideas, tracing direct continuities between his early years as a paternalistic businessman, and his later career as a radical political leader. In doing so, it eschews the myth of New Lanark as a unidimensional ‘model’ village and addresses the ambiguities of Owen’s journey from paternalism to socialism.
- About the authors
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Ophélie Siméon is Associate Professor in British History at Sorbonne Nouvelle University, Paris, France.
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Bibliographic Information
- Bibliographic Information
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- Book Title
- Robert Owen’s Experiment at New Lanark
- Book Subtitle
- From Paternalism to Socialism
- Authors
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- Ophélie Siméon
- Series Title
- Palgrave Studies in Utopianism
- Copyright
- 2017
- Publisher
- Palgrave Macmillan
- Copyright Holder
- The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s)
- eBook ISBN
- 978-3-319-64227-7
- DOI
- 10.1007/978-3-319-64227-7
- Hardcover ISBN
- 978-3-319-64226-0
- Edition Number
- 1
- Number of Pages
- IX, 173
- Number of Illustrations
- 7 b/w illustrations, 6 illustrations in colour
- Topics
