Metaphors of the Middle: the Discovery of the Petite Bourgeoisie 1880–1914

Abstract

AFTER a long period of neglect, during which historians had looked towards the petite bourgeoisie primarily to heap upon it the responsibility for fascism, the last fifteen years has seen a growing research interest in the social and political history of die world of small retail, artisanal and manufacturing enterprise. The result of diis attention has been paradoxical, on the one hand establishing the petite bourgeoisie as a focus for sustained research, while on the other confirming how difficult it is to see the owners of small retail and manufacturing enterprise as a coherent social group or social class. The combination of the owner's labour and capital widiin family-centred enterprises might indicate a distinct position for the petite bourgeoisie within the social structure, but various forces militated against a social or demographic identity for die proprietors of small enterprise: the high rate of business turnover, die limited proportion of petits bourgeois who remain in diat position through their careers, and die low rate of continuity between generations. Although political struggle was important in die formation of any class, one could go further widi respect to die petite bourgeoisie and suggest that it was only at times of political crisis and action, only through die discourse and actions of its organisations, diat a petit-bourgeois identity might emerge. It is not surprising, dierefore, diat research has focused above all on diose years between die 1880s and the First World War, when die emergence of interest groups and increasing political mobilisation seemed to offer evidence of a real petit-bourgeois identity.