ABSTRACT
Originally published in the Star newspaper on 15 April 1819, An Address to the Working Classes provides a link between Robert Owen’s theory of character formation and his mistrust of democratic, grassroots-led political practice. Arguing that the time was ripe for the definitive improvement of working-class conditions, he attempted to present his “science of society” as an alternative to any antagonistic means of achieving change, especially political agitation. For Owen, the working-classes first needed to allow themselves to be re-educated in the truth of his doctrine of circumstances. Once they understood that all human beings were equally the product of their environment, and that class-based divisions were therefore mere social constructs, the poor would be able to better themselves without encroaching on the lives and riches of the wealthy. The existing order of things has placed some of the fellow-men in situations of power, and in the possession of privileges on which they have been taught to set a value.
