GUEST BLOG: Ian Powell – The Misrepresentation of Luddism
Whenever the terms Luddism and Luddites are used they are invariably used in a negative or derogatory manner. Calling something Luddism and people Luddites is intended as an insult, sometimes forcefully so.
This is because it is associated with machine smashing by rural English labourers in the early 19th century. In other words, smashing the new technology (power looms) of that era because of backward looking opposition.
Even labour movement conscious Helen Clark used Luddism as an insult
Arguably, in my politically thinking time, Helen Clark is Aotearoa New Zealand’s most academically conscious prime minister of labour movement history.
But even she used the terms as a form of criticism. This alone is testimony to the pervasive prevalence of this mainstream perception.
Early Luddism understanding in New Zealand
Luddism began in Nottinghamshire in 1811 extending to north-west England and Yorkshire. The movement only lasted until 1816.
But, while other labour movement struggles predated, postdated or were concurrent with it, the imagery of Luddism is the most memorable in contemporary public consciousness.
Early New Zealand newspapers were scathing of Luddism even though they only began to appear around 35 years after its demise.
The first refence to Luddism was on 2 November 1850 in the Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle. It centred on the following quote from England which was subsequently repeated in other newspaper references:
Who made the quartern-loaf and Luddites rise?
Who filled the butchers’ shops with blue flies
Hardly complimentary! For clarification a quartern was a pint of beer.
Luddism as a positive force
By placing it in its true historical context British Marxist historian EP Thompson instead describes Luddism as a positive force in the development of class consciousness within the English working class.
Edward Thompson on Luddism as a positive force
Although its demise was well before the qualitative change that Thompson analysed and linked to the political reform of the early 1830s in his groundbreaking book on this consciousness The Making of the English Working Class.
He concluded that Luddism’s influence was to be a significant ‘helping hand’ for this advance.
Contrary to the common view Luddites were not against new technology. This is despite their focus on power looms.
Instead their violent machine smashing was targeted at those employers with power looms who refused to pay minimum wages and improve working conditions, particularly for women and children.
Context is important. Not only was there an absence of formal democratic political rights in England at that time, but also limited constitutional rights had been removed under the hated anti-combination laws.
Luddism was, in fact, a strongly supported popular movement. Brutal suppression was required to defeat it.
But, despite the success of this repression, Luddism did make a positive difference. It helped boost and inspire campaigning for parliamentary reform beginning with the repeal of the combination laws.
Particularly from the 1850s, the English migrants in New Zealand who advocated for working class interests were not Luddites. There was no obvious Luddism identification.
But the movement directly and indirectly influenced many of those within this emerging working class consciousness from the early 1830s in England and who subsequently migrated here.
Politics of Popular Luddism
Tech journalist Brian Merchant’s book commends Luddism
The positivity of Luddism has now come to the fore again by Brian Merchant who is the tech columnist for the Los Angeles Times. In 2017 he was the bestselling author of ‘The One Device: The Secret History of the iPhone.
Six years later Merchant has published another well-received book, Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion against Big Tech.
Merchant’s book favourably reviewed by Professor Mark Allison
In December 2024 the latter book was favourably reviewed by Professor Mark Allison (Ohio Wesleyan University) in the American socialist magazine Monthly Review: Attenuated politics of popular Luddism.
In his book Merchant refers to a scene in the 1999 film Office Space in which three disaffected workers vent their frustration at the indignities of cubicle life by demolishing a laser printer.
He argues in a spirited exploration of the Luddite phenomenon, that the identification of Luddism with misguided resistance to machinery is a prime example of history being written by the victors.
In Merchant’s words, “The Luddite movement was not about technology. It was about workers’ rights.” His approach is to draw parallels between Luddism and the burgeoning resistance to Silicon Valley digital capitalism by those degraded and deskilled as a consequence.
His perspective is different from Thompson’s in that he focusses on the degrading and deskilling nature of the work that remained as a consequence of power looms and new digital technology. However, they are complementary rather than conflicting perspectives.
As Merchant identifies the Luddites were not crazed technophobes. Many were themselves amateur inventors or mechanical enthusiasts. Smashing machines was a bargaining tactic used when all other avenues for redress had been exhausted.
Luddism wanted better enforceable employment protection laws. Alternatives were proposed, but scornfully rejected, that would enable manufacturers to make a profit without reducing their employees to “penury”.
A rational and logical political message
In other works, machine smashing was the “the bargaining tool of last resort.” In this context it was a “logical response”.
Do you want this to be part of your political legacy Prime Minister
Although loosely organised Luddites were not disorganised. They showed much discipline and precision (even politeness apparently) in their raids only targeting particularly exploitative employers. There was nothing irrational about them.
Somewhere in this is a message for the anti-worker rights ideological politics, including even in health and safety in the workplace, of this hard right National-ACT-NZ First government.
The more exploitative capitalism becomes in this ideological environment, the more the true spirit of Luddism may have some resonance and in some form.
Prime Minister Luxon take note. Do you want this to be part of your legacy?
Ian Powell was Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, the professional union representing senior doctors and dentists in New Zealand, for over 30 years, until December 2019. He is now a health systems, labour market, and political commentator living in the small river estuary community of Otaihanga (the place by the tide). First published at Political Bytes
It’s interesting how the label ‘Luddite’ has been reduced to shorthand for technophobia, when historically it was more about workers challenging the economic consequences of industrial change. In many ways, it feels like a reminder that critiques of technology are often critiques of power, not progress itself. That distinction seems just as relevant in today’s debates about AI and automation as it was in the 19th century.
The people who carried out the Luddite activity which was centred on disabling machines to do the work that had traditionally and reliably been their own skill and job and earner were aware of their lives, living styles and social cohesion being demolished. Educated humans are caught up in an overweening confidence in their own understanding; being progressive and advanced often means the educated going forward and others being behind in small or large ways.
The social side as well as the work and strength that it gives to lusty young men and women shows up in this great song about work with allusion to play with the matching gender, from The Neckbellies, guitar and spoons (joked about as being the Heavy Metal part.) It’s more than just losing a secure job, it’s losing pride and the respect that skills and hard working ability convey to the person and family behind; as strong families support each other. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Spi0yPY6hRo
The Neckbellies – Same Old Man (working at the mill) – Appalachian trad.
Eddie Arndt Music 2021