ABSTRACT
The important voluntary societies created in the period 1780-1850 were concerned with a variety of activities ranging from poor relief, medical aid, moral reform, public order, education and thrift, to the diffusion of science and culture and the organization of leisure. The chapter offers the analysis of the development of voluntary societies as a social phenomenon as well as the analysis of the development pattern of particular sectors of voluntary activity. The voluntary group membership was mainly drawn from the middle class and most societies were dominated by the urban elite of that class. Very few of the gentry or members of the aristocracy were involved except as patrons, and except in the metropolitan-based societies of Edinburgh and London, where these societies had ambitions for national influence. This group of voluntary societies involved in several interlocking social processes which were vital to the distribution and mediation of power within British towns.
