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BEATRICE BEATRICE
WEBBWEBB
Beatrice Potter Webb
Self-taught economist
Socialist and reformer
Co-founder of London School of Economics and Political Science
Beatrice Webb born: January 2, 1858 in Standish House in Gloucestershire, England-- Richard Potter and Laurencina Heyworth (8th of 10 children)
Died 30th April, 1943
Father: Wealthy railway entrepreneur
Her Education: PhilosophyScienceMathematics
Richard Potter
Early YearsEarly political inspirations: Father, father’s acquaintances, and cousins
Mother’s friend, Herbert Spencer
Early involvement in social work was assisting her cousin, Charles Booth in carrying out a survey of the Victorian slums of London.
Beatrice learned first hand about the life of the poor.
Charles Booth’s Research
Contemporary social problems
Recognized limitations of philanthropy and conditional charity in addressing poverty
Devised, organized, and funded comprehensive and scientific social surveys of London life
Supported old age pensions to alleviate destitution in old age (major cause of poverty)
Beatrice’s Views on Poverty
Skeptical of charitable work by rich women
Wanted to understand causes of poverty
Met Sidney Webb in her research on cooperative societies in Britain’s industrial towns
Early Years1892: Beatrice and Sidney Webb married
After her father’s death, Beatrice inherited income of £1000 a year (appox. $122,000 today)
Sidney Webb gave up civil servant post
He and Beatrice --Full time research and politics
Views on Poverty
Published The Cooperative Movement in Great Britain in 1891, introducing concepts:
Cooperative Federalism
Cooperative individualism
Co-operative FederalismFavored consumer co-operative societies
Proponents included JTW Mitchell, Charles Gide, Paul Lambart, and Beatrice Webb
Consumers form co-operative societies
Co-operative societies purchase farms or factories
Profits paid as dividends to member co-operators, rather than to their workers
Co-operative Individualism
Basis for limiting and decentralizing the powers of the StateTo secure and preserve justice
Favors workers' co-operative wholesale societies
Profits paid as dividends to their workers
Proponents in Britain: Christian Socialists and later writers like Joseph Reeves, as a path to State Socialism.
Helping the PoorBefore she could address social problems
Must learn more about what she wanted to correct
Not the individual, which was entirely at fault but the structure
Inquired about labor unions
And economic conditions of working class to help more efficiently
Beatrice and SidneyMarriage seemed completely egalitarian
Expressed unhappiness when she wrote,
"I never write, except in my diary in my own style", she continues "I have constrained my intellect, forced it to concentrate on one subject after another; on some of the dullest and least illuminating details of social organization…”
Accomplishments
1887: Beatrice Potter Webb wrote her first book on working conditions
Developed reform laws
Interested in how to use facts to generate policy-relevant theory
Research and PracticeOthers, tried to form a social science combining research and application
Jane AddamsUniversity of Chicago's Department of Sociology looked at empirical studies as "women's work"
"Most of the social and political reforms of the time came about as a result of the Webb's research and political insight”
• Important economist • Campaigned against capitalism
• Fabian Society• Reconstruct society with highest moral possibilities
Beatrice and Sidney Webb wrote The History of Trade Unionism (1894) and Industrial Democracy (1897). To convince people to create new political party that defended socialism in parliament
1905 government established Commission to look into “the laws relating to the relief of poor persons in the United Kingdom”
Webbs wrote Minority Report:- End of the Poor Laws
- Efficient use of labour resources
- Improve essential services--education and health
The Poor Law
To provide relief for the poor
Developed in 16th-century England
Maintained until after World War II
Elizabethan Poor Laws (1597–98)
Provided relief for aged, sick, and
infants
Able-bodied poor work in workhouses
The Poor LawExpenditures on public relief was so
great
New Poor Law enacted in 1834Harsher philosophy
Pauperism among able-bodied as
moral failingNo relief for able-bodied poor except
employment in workhouses
Workers to seek regular employment
rather than charity
The Poor Law--WorkhouseFamilies split upHad to wear uniformsStrict rulesDiet--bread and watery soup
Conditions so terrible that only people who desperately needed help would go there
• Beatrice Webb influence for socialist, democratic, and moderate government
• Role in economy with the London School of Economics and Political Science
• Wrote the principles of social welfare in the Minority Report as well as hundreds of books
In closingNever had children
Beatrice chose “brain work” rather than motherhood
She died in 1943.
Her ashes initially interred in garden of Webb home in Passfield Corner (with her husband who died in 1947)
George Bernard Shaw succeeded in having them reburied in Westminster Abbey