Robert Owen’s New Moral World: Education in a Utopian Socialist Society
Robert Owen, born May 14, 1771, in Newtown, Wales, was a philanthropist and utopian socialist. Recognizing how the trajectory of the industrial world threatened the social, political, and economic rights, along with the physical and mental well-being of the working class, Owen dedicated his life to creating what he called a “New Moral World.” This utopian socialist reimagination of society was based on cooperative living, fair employment, and full-time schooling for children. Owen pursued his vision as the manager of the New Lanark cotton mills, creating a work environment that prioritized the well-being of the employees, while also remaining efficient and profitable. Owen wrote a series of essays between 1812 and 1814, titled A New View of Society, which laid out the principles of his New Moral World. The essays also described how his philosophy was implemented at New Lanark. Above all else, Owen believed education had the power to shape human nature and consequently, educational reform was fundamental to his vision for a New Moral World.
Owen’s success at New Lanark was not unfounded — he had experience as a businessman and knew how to be in charge of large operations. Earlier, at age 19, after a series of increasingly successful business ventures — from a wholesale drapery to a yarn spinning business — Robert Owen was put in charge of 500 workers as the manager at Drinkwater’s Bank Top Mill in Manchester. It was during a business trip to Glasgow, that Owen met Caroline Dale, his future wife, and was offered the chance to visit New Lanark, which was her father’s enterprise (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre).
The New Lanark cotton mills were founded by David Dale and opened in 1786. Four large mills were constructed by waterfalls on River Clyde, to provide for the water-powered cotton spinning machinery. Housing, a school, and a church were also constructed for the workers. In the early 1790s, the population at New Lanark had grown substantially to about 2,000. Half of the population is suspected to have been under 18, most of whom were workers at the mills. New Lanark was not unique in the problems it faced as the population grew — such problems were being faced everywhere with the rise of industrialization. Problems commonly faced included “population growth, urbanisation, health and disease, crime and policing, children’s employment, adult unemployment, poverty and popular education” (“Robert Owen and New Lanark”). Children as young as six years old were often employed in dangerous working conditions, not receiving an education. Robert Owen became the mill manager in 1800 and followed in the path of Dale’s philanthropy work, who had already established a school to educate the children living at New Lanark. Owen spent the next 25 years, until 1825, in charge of New Lanark.
Owen’s theories for a New Moral World were put into action at New Lanark. It was there that his work as a social reformer truly began. In “William Maclure’s Boatload of Knowledge: Science and Education into the Midwest,” Donald E. Pitzer describes the New Moral World as “a world of enlightenment and prosperity leading to human happiness, which Owen defined as mental, physical, and moral health enjoyed in a rational way of life. It would displace the Old Immoral World of ignorance, superstition, selfishness, and suffering intensified by the first wave of the Industrial Revolution” (Pitzer). At New Lanark, Owen instituted a range of new rules and practices. Much stricter than previous managers, he would dismiss an employee for “theft, fraud, absenteeism [or] persistent drunkenness” (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). Owen decreased the working day from 11 hours to 10.5 hours, began a village store, and hired a doctor to care for those who were ill. Owen also didn’t allow anyone under 10 years old to work at the mill. Rather, he established a free, full-time schooling program that began at age three (“View of New Lanark by John Winning”; Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). In 1816, the “Institute for the Formation of Character” was opened at New Lanark. This was the basis for his philosophy. Owen wrote in the second of his A New View of Society essays: “Children are, without exception, passive and wonderfully contrived compounds; which, by an accurate previous and subsequent attention, founded on a correct knowledge of the subject, may be formed collectively to have any human character” (A New View of Society by Robert Owen). Owen also went on to write, “That any character, from the worst to the best, may, with the certainty of a law of nature, be given by society to all of the human race, — and that through this knowledge every one may be made to become at maturity, good, wise, and happy” (Owen, 10). Owen believed that the “making of a character” began at a young age, and that education was crucial to setting a child on the right path. He also believed that the formation of human character could be exacted to a science: “[Owen] came to feel that it was possible to discover the laws governing human nature and to have a practical science of society” (Pitzer). Owen described his work at New Lanark as “the most important experiment for the happiness of the human race that has yet been instituted in any part of the world” (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). Owen sought to establish this “practical science of society” to create a morally-just, enlightened, and prosperous world.
In The New Harmony Movement, George Lockwood analyzes Robert Owen’s efforts for social reform: “Education, indeed, was at the very basis of Owen’s philosophy: man’s character, he insisted, was formed by his environment, and the only way of making good citizens was by providing conditions in which man’s better nature would be encouraged to grow, and in which body and mind would be well cared for and trained in right habits and ways of living. The whole benevolent system at New Lanark was based on this proposition” (Lockwood, vii). Schools at New Lanark were extremely progressive compared to what was available at the time. Lacking a rigid structure, an emphasis on memorization, and a reward-punishment system, Owen’s education system was a stark difference from traditional schools. Dancing, physical exercise, and play were held in high regard. The following image, made by artist George Hunt in 1825, is a depiction of a dancing class at The Institute for the Formation of Character in New Lanark (“Mr. Owen’s Institution, New Lanark”).
The image shows children at New Lanark wearing the uniform Owen designed for them, which was “a toga like garment made of white cotton that was light and comfortable for the children to wear and well suited to dancing and physical activity” (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). One of Owen’s sons, Robert Dale Owen, gave a detailed account of the room depicted above in his 1824 book about the Institute: “The [room] has the walls hung round with representations of the most striking zoological and mineralogical specimens…At one end there is a gallery, adapted for the purpose of an orchestra, and at the other end are hung very large representations of the two hemispheres…This room is used as a lecture- and ball-room, and it is here that the dancing and singing lessons are daily given” (Education in Robert Owen’s New Society: The New Lanark Institute and Schools).
The schooling system at New Lanark was designed so that children would be spared from their parents’ prejudices as early as possible. This was because Owen believed parents who had not received a proper education and lacked a good character would be a poor influence on their children. Thus, as soon as a child could walk, they were put under the supervision of older children at the nursery (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). Because of this, mothers, who would normally spend their time looking after a child, could instead spend that time working at the mills. From age 3–6, children at New Lanark went to the “infant school.” The infant school was held outside, weather permitting, and “no child [was] forced in any way, not even to mid-morning rest, although ‘when an infant felt inclined to sleep it should be quietly allowed to do so’” (Education in Robert Owen’s New Society: The New Lanark Institute and Schools). Then, from 7–10, children attended the “junior school.” Here, lessons included “nature study, history, geography and art, as well as reading, writing and arithmetic” (Introducing Robert Owen — New Lanark Visitor Centre). Field studies were also incorporated into the curriculum. Owen had cleared paths through the surrounding fields and forest for students to take walks through and collect specimens (Education in Robert Owen’s New Society: The New Lanark Institute and Schools). The school was progressive, with no corporal punishment. Music and dancing were incorporated into the curriculum. It was emphasized that children always understood what they were learning, why they were learning it, and that they enjoyed school. Even as children began to work in the mills, they were encouraged to continue their education through evening classes provided at the Institute.
Owen was convinced that he could use his model of cooperative living at New Lanark to develop a utopian society that would transform the world. Pitzer writes, “To accomplish his secular utopia, Owen proposed that democratic, socialistic “communities of equality” averaging 1,200 persons each should be created worldwide” (Pitzer). In 1825, Owen purchased a plot of land in Indiana, investing half of his savings into his social experiment. Owen recruited teachers, scientists, and philanthropists who aligned with his mission, and invited “any and all to come.” In April 1825, after arriving in New Harmony, Indiana, Owen proclaimed: “I am come to this country…to introduce an entire new system of society; to change it from an ignorant, selfish system to an enlightened social system which shall gradually unite all interests into one, and remove all causes for contest between individuals” (Lockwood, x). While New Lanark was only able to actualize part of Owen’s vision, New Harmony gave him total freedom to build the world he envisioned. Though New Harmony only lasted a few years, from ~1825–1828, Owen never gave up promoting his educational philosophy. As Owen declared in his Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark on the day the Institute for the Formation of Character opened, January 1, 1816:
“The causes which fashioned me in the womb, — the circumstances by which I was surrounded from my birth, and over which I had no influence whatever…gave me a mind that could not rest satisfied without trying every possible expedient to relieve my fellow-men from their wretched situation, and formed it of such a texture that obstacles of the most formidable nature served but to increase my ardour, and to fix within me a settled determination, either to overcome them, or to die in the attempt”
(Robert Owen: An Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark).
A social reformer ahead of his time, Owen committed his life to his vision for a New Moral World, truly believing a re-arrangement of society was on the horizon. In the words of Frank Podmore, “Robert Owen was essentially a dreamer, and it is ultimately the dreamers that move the world” (Podmore).
