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Ideas in action: the politics of Prussian child labor reform, 1817–1839

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Abstract

This article explains the political origins of an 1839 law regulating the factory employment of children in Prussia. The article has two aims. First, it seeks to explain why Prussia adopted the particular law that it did. Existing historical explanations of this particular policy change are not correct, largely because they fail to take into account the actual motivations and intentions of key reformers. Second, the article contributes to theories of the role of ideas in public policymaking. Ideas interact with institutional and political factors to serve as motivators and as resources for policy change. As motivators, they drive political action and shape the content of policy programs; as resources, they enable political actors to recruit supporters and forge alliances. I offer a theory of the relationship between ideas, motivation, and political action, and I develop a methodological framework for assessing the reliability of political actors’ expressed motivations. Further, I explain how political actors use ideas as resources by deploying three specific ideational strategies: framing, borrowing, and citing. By tracing how different understandings of the child labor problem motivated and were embodied in two competing child labor policy proposals, I show how the ideas underlying reform had significant consequences for policy outcomes.

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Notes

  1. These documents consist mainly of internal government communications, reports and legislative drafts collected from the Landeshauptarchiv (LHA) in Koblenz, Germany and from the Geheimes Staatsarchiv (GStA) in Berlin, Germany. These documents were not public at the time of their production. I relied primarily on the papers of Ernst von Bodelschwingh, governor of the Rhineland Province from 1834 to 1842, and the records of the Prussian Ministry of Industry and Commerce. These sets of documents represent the bulk of the surviving historical record of early Prussian child labor reform, as identified by various German historians. The materials were all handwritten in the old German script. I photocopied or scanned the documents, transcribed them, and summarized their content in detailed analytic narratives, which I then used as the empirical basis of the analysis presented here. This original research was supplemented and verified by several secondary accounts of early Prussian child labor reform, especially Anton (1953) and Kastner (2004).

  2. The law also required children under 16 to be given 1.5 h of daily outdoor breaks; prohibited children from working at night, on Sundays or on holidays; and required that working children be granted the opportunity to receive religious instruction until confirmation. It required employers to keep a list of data on child workers, and imposed a system of modest fines for violations. It empowered local authorities to grant exceptions to the rules in cases of work interruptions caused by accidents or natural disasters.

  3. Many other European states passed laws specifically regulating the industrial labor of children in the 19th century. These included: Bavaria (1840); Baden (1840); France (1841); Italy (1843); Austria (1859); Saxony (1861); Württemberg (1862); Denmark (1873); Switzerland (1873); Netherlands (1872); Sweden (1881); Belgium (1884); Russia (1882); and Finland (1889). The United States did not regulate child labor at the federal level until 1938, with the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act. Many American states adopted their own child labor regulations, however, beginning with Massachusetts in 1836. Meyer (1894); Trattner (1970); Rahikainen (2004).

  4. Letter from Hardenberg to Merckel in Breslau, von Heydebreck in Berlin, von Bülow in Magdeburg, von Vincke in Münster, and Count Solms-Laubach in Cologne and Minister von Ingersleben in Koblenz, 9/5/1817. In Hoppe, Kuczynski and Waldmann (1960), p. 23–26.

  5. In his earlier work on the rise of Keynesianism, Hall makes similar claims: “Keynesian ideas were a potent weapon in the hands of those who sought to justify a new role for the state against the arguments of the old laissez faire…. Politicians take up a new set of economic ideas to wield like a weapon in political conflict” (1989, pp. 366–367).

  6. Of course, in discourse and in practice, norms and paradigms very often swim together and can be quite difficult to distinguish. This distinction is primarily an analytic, not an ontological, one.

  7. Borrowing is similar to what Sewell (1992) calls the transposition of schemas from one context to another; but whereas Sewell conceptualizes resources as “actual” (i.e., non-virtual) and thus as distinct from schemas and ideas (pp. 10–11), I treat ideas as a type of resource. Borrowing is also similar to the process Campbell (2004) calls “bricolage”.

  8. The conceptualization of framing as a strategy deployed to garner support for policy proposals is new and differs from Goffman’s original conceptualization of frames as cognitive lenses through which people perceive, categorize, and make sense of the world (Goffmann 1974; see also Bleich 2002).

  9. An exception to this was the Allgemeiner Deutscher Handels- und Gewerbeverein (General German Association of Commerce and Industry), founded in 1819 by Friedrich List to advocate for tariff reforms. This Association did not get involved in the policy debates surrounding child labor reform.

  10. Altenstein to Schuckmann. 7/4/1828. GstA Berlin Rep 120 BB VII 1.4 Vol 1, p. 30b.

  11. Hardenberg to Merckel in Breslau, von Heydebreck in Berlin, von Bülow in Magdeburg, von Vincke in Münster, and Count Solms-Laubach in Cologne and Minister von Ingersleben in Koblenz, 9/5/1817. In Hoppe (1958), pp. 70–74; see also Hoppe, Kuczynski, and Waldmann (1960), pp. 23–26.

  12. “Zirkularreskript des Kultusministers,” June 26, 1824. Transcribed in Anton (1953), pp. 189–190. The survey consisted of the following questions: (1) Are children employed in the factories in the region? (2) In what occupations? (3) At what age? (4) How many hours per day, and at what hours in the day or night? (5) How do the living conditions of these working children compare to other children of the same class? (6) How does the health of these children compare to other children of the same class? (7) If the working children’s health is poorer, what is the reason for this? (8) How does the health of adults who worked as children compare to the health of those who did not? (9) In light of these findings, what legal regulations does the regional government consider desirable? (10) How is the necessary schooling secured for these children? (11) What is their moral condition?

  13. Altenstein to Schuckmann. 11/8/1825. GstA Berlin Rep 120 BB VII 1.4 vol. 1, pp. 17a–17b.

  14. Schulze, Johannes. GstA Rep. 92, Altenstein, A. Via, Nr. 36. Transcribed in Müsebeck (1918), pp. 293–307.

  15. The 1819 British child labor act established nine as the minimum working age, limited working hours to twelve a day, and prohibited night work for children. The law had little practical impact, however, because its inspection and enforcement mechanism was weak. Nonetheless, it was an important advance on the 1802 Apprentices Act—which applied only to apprentices—in that it represented the first attempt at state regulation of the free labor market (Thomas 1948).

  16. Frederick William III to Altenstein and Schuckmann. 5/12/1828. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, p. 85a.

  17. Altenstein to Schuckmann. 7/4/1828. GstA Berlin Rep 12 BB VII 1.4 Vol. 1, p. 30a-36a.

  18. Bodelscwingh to A.D. Fallenstein, 3/30/1848. Reprinted in Diest (1898), pp. 14–27.

  19. Bodelschwingh to the district governments of Düsseldorf, Aachen and Cologne, 3/31/1935, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 1–2.

  20. District government of Düsseldorf to Bodelschwingh, 8/22/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 7–19.

  21. District government of Cologne to Bodelschwingh, 11/9/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 43–44.

  22. An industrial town within the Aachen district.

  23. District government of Aachen to Bodelschwingh, 9/6/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 25–29; Aachen chamber of commerce to Aachen district government, 6/16/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 p. 31.

  24. Eupen chamber of commerce to Aachen district government, 7/3/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 33–34.

  25. Bodelschwingh to Altenstein. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 49–61.

  26. Bodelschwingh, 11/21/1835. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 p. 52.

  27. This quote is taken from a report produced by a committee formed in 1837 to study the child labor problem. In particular, the committee criticized Bodelschwingh’s characterization of his proposal as a “Factory-School Law,” arguing that the central problem was not the lack of school attendance among working children, but rather the fact that they were over-worked. Jacobi, Altgelt, Viebahn and Woringen to Bodelschwingh, 4/29/1837, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 85–112.

  28. Ibid.

  29. Bodelschwingh to Altenstein, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082: 11/21/1835, p. 49–61; undated, pp. 68.

  30. Bodelschwingh to Altenstein, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 79.

  31. Bodelschwingh to Altenstein and Rother, undated, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, p. 68; Bodelschwingh to Altenstein, undated, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, p. 79; Bodelschwingh to Altenstein, 6/15/1837, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, p. 81;

  32. Minutes of the proceedings of the Fifth Landtag of the Rhineland Province, 7/6/1837. Archiv des Landschaftverbandes Rheinland, Nr. 278, pp. 486–501.

  33. Altenstein to Bodelschwingh, 8/20/1837, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, p. 124.

  34. Bodelschwingh to the Ministers of Education and the Interior. 8/1/1838. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 129–130.

  35. Ministry of the Interior to Bodelschwingh. 11/20/1838. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 BB VII 1,4 Bd. 1 p. 119.

  36. Bodelschwingh.to Altenstein. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 139–142.

  37. Heshe. 12/21/1838. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 151–172.

  38. Rochow to Frederick William III. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, pp. 72a–80b.

  39. Ergebnisse der ueber die Frauen- und Kinder-Arbeit in den Fabriken auf Beschluss des Bundesraths angestellten Erhebungen. 1877. Berlin: Carl Henmann’s Verlag;

    Report of Professor Dr. Brentano (Breslau), July 6, 1872. Verhandlungen der Eisenacher Versammlung, zur Besprechung der Sozialen Frage am 6. Und 7. October, 1872. Auf Grund der stenographischen Niederschrift von Heinrich Koller in Berlin, hg. Vom Staendigen Ausschuss. Leipzig 1873, pp. 14–15.

  40. Altenstein to Schuckmann. 7/4/1828. GstA Berlin Rep 12 BB VII 1.4 Vol. 1, p. 30a–36a; Bodelschwingh to the district governments of Düsseldorf, Aachen and Cologne, 3/31/1935, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 1–2; see also Kastner (2004), p. 154

  41. Rochow to Altenstein. 9/13/1838. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, pp. 24a–26b.

  42. For example, District government of Düsseldorf to Bodelschwingh, 8/22/1835, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 7–19; Jacobi, Altgelt, Viebahn and Woringen to Bodelschwingh, 4/29/1837, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, pp. 85–112.

  43. Rochow to Altenstein. 9/13/1838. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, pp. 24a–26b.

  44. Bodelschwingh. 11/21/1835. LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082 pp. 49–61.

  45. Bodelschwingh to Altenstein, LHA Koblenz Best. 403 Nr. 8082, p. 79.

  46. Rochow to Altenstein. 9/13/1838. GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, pp. 24a–26b; Rochow to Altenstein, 1/6/1839, GstA Berlin, Rep. 120 B.B. VII 3.1, pp. 53a–54b.

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Acknowledgments

This research was made possible by a grant from the Deutsche Akademische Austauschdienst (DAAD) and a National Science Foundation Dissertation Improvement Grant. I would like to thank Bruce Carruthers, Chas Camic, Ann Orloff, Art Stinchcombe, Nicki Beisel, John Campbell, Peter Hall, Tim Guinnane, Sida Liu, Corey Fields, Kieran Bezila, Heather Schoenfeld, Ellen Berrey, Berit Vannebo, Michaela DeSoucey, Barbara Anderson, and the Theory and Society reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions.

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  1. Department of Sociology, Northwestern University, 1810 Chicago Ave., Evanston, IL, 60208, USA

    Elisabeth Anderson

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Anderson, E. Ideas in action: the politics of Prussian child labor reform, 1817–1839. Theor Soc 42, 81–119 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11186-012-9186-4

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