ABSTRACT
A new view of society becomes necessary when the circumstances in which society finds itself prompt the generality of the men and women who compose it to a new view of the possibilities it provides for their fulfilling themselves. Robert Owen lived in a time when a new view of society had become necessary, when institutions and forms of organisation had to change in order to accommodate both the development of the industrial revolution through its second and potent phase, the age of coal and iron, steam and railways; and the possibilities provided by that development. Again, not a new view of society: for it boils down to an attempt to reinforce the power of trade unionism within the existing order. After Victory in Europe Day, both the power and the justification were gone. After the tumult and the shouting, there came the Recessional.
