Security, Population and the New Management of the Poor

Abstract

The 1830s–1850s saw intense scrutiny into the lives of poor children through a plethora of commissions and committees which were established to investigate working practices and criminal activity. The importance of these commissions, as well as the role of expert witnesses in influencing public opinion and in shaping social policy, and the key role of commissioners and inspectors in ensuring the implementation of these policies cannot be emphasised enough. These developments are tied to the broader genealogy of the emergence of a governmentality as part of the modern nation-state and the disciplinary apparatuses that were gradually put into place as mechanisms of normalisation (Foucault, 1979b, 2007). This was a period in which the construction of poor children as ‘other’ becomes firmly embedded within an emerging discourse which identified these children as in need of control, containment or protection. The rapid growth of cities during this period of industrialisation produced enormous problems related to poverty. The influx of large numbers of dispossessed people, both young and old, arriving in search of employment and housing and in need of support from the parishes contributed to a huge strain on resources. It is against this background that a shift emerges which finds expression through the reframing of the Poor Laws (1834) and the implementation of much harsher punishment regimes.

Beggars live well; have hot beefsteaks and beer for breakfast, fare well at night and are never poor. (Miles, 1839: 103)