Hatcher 2013

Download as pdf or txt
Download as pdf or txt
You are on page 1of 19

European Journal of Training and Development

Robert Owen: a historiographic study of a pioneer of human resource development


Tim Hatcher
Article information:
To cite this document:
Tim Hatcher, (2013),"Robert Owen: a historiographic study of a pioneer of human resource development", European
Journal of Training and Development, Vol. 37 Iss 4 pp. 414 - 431
Permanent link to this document:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/03090591311319799
Downloaded on: 25 June 2016, At: 05:18 (PT)
References: this document contains references to 59 other documents.
To copy this document: permissions@emeraldinsight.com
The fulltext of this document has been downloaded 1051 times since 2013*
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Users who downloaded this article also downloaded:


(2013),"Innovation and human resource development (HRD)", European Journal of Training and Development, Vol. 38 Iss
1/2 pp. 2-14 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/EJTD-11-2013-0128
(2007),"Evaluating the effectiveness of utility privatization effortsThe views expressed in this paper are those of the author
and do not reflect the official policy or position of the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or United States
Government.", Journal of Facilities Management, Vol. 5 Iss 2 pp. 86-102 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/14725960710751843
(1999),"Fayol’s Principles and the Rule of St Benedict: is there anything new under the sun?", Journal of Management
History, Vol. 5 Iss 5 pp. 269-276

Access to this document was granted through an Emerald subscription provided by emerald-srm:464745 []
For Authors
If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service
information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please
visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information.
About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.com
Emerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of
more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online
products and additional customer resources and services.
Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication
Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation.

*Related content and download information correct at time of download.


The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/2046-9012.htm

EJTD
37,4 Robert Owen: a historiographic
study of a pioneer of human
resource development
414
Tim Hatcher
Department of Leadership, Policy, Adult and Higher Education,
Received 13 February 2013
Accepted 14 February 2013 North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina, USA
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ideals and activities of the nineteenth century
Welsh industrialist and reformer Robert Owen (1771-1858), and how they informed modern human
resource development (HRD) concepts and practices and provided evidence of Owen as a HRD pioneer.
Design/methodology/approach – Historiography provided a method to understand how historical
figures, and the context in which they lived and worked, inform contemporary research and practice.
Findings – Contextual factors of economics, politics and societal demands and the influences of
Owen’s early life, his immersion within the British factory system and the creation of the New Lanark
mill village, Owen’s great work experiment, revealed a strong impact on his thinking and actions.
Thematic findings included: managing people and profit, education and training, pioneering
workplace innovations, and the failure of the New Harmony, Indiana community. Themes provided
unique historical evidence that education and development of workers, and the creation of humane
work and community environments are linked across time and contexts to modern concepts of human
resource development and thus supported Owen as a HRD pioneer.
Practical implications – Understanding the ideals and workplace experiments and contextual
influences on a historical figure such as Robert Owen illustrate how modern concepts of workforce
training and education, diversity, equality and justice and social responsibility originated and the
importance of contexts on their development and success.
Social implications – Contexts of economics, politics and societal demands greatly influence
organizations and the creation of humane workplaces that nurture human potential.
Originality/value – The study brings history and historiography as a research method to the
forefront of HRD research and practice. The study provides the beginnings of a collective historical
memory that can contribute to HRD defining itself and establishing its identity as a discipline.
Keywords Robert Owen, Human resource development, Historiography, Work reform, Social reform,
Communitarianism, Utopianism, British industrial revolution, British factory system, Management
Paper type Conceptual paper

As post-Colonial America continued the practice of indentured servitude as its “original


labour force” and managed labor through ownership of “bound white servants”
(Galenson, 1981, p. 32), back in Scotland the nineteenth century industrialist Robert Owen
(1771-1858) was creating worker-oriented factory villages with humanitarian oversight.
The British industrial revolution was in full swing when Owen came of age. The
European Journal of Training and detrimental impact that British industrialism was having on working people and
Development society, coupled with his diverse business experiences and intellectual development,
Vol. 37 No. 4, 2013
pp. 414-431 nurtured his unique philosophies, ideas and activities. As a factory owner, manager
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited and workplace and social reformer his concepts and methods were innovative and laid
2046-9012
DOI 10.1108/03090591311319799 the early foundations of humane workplaces and developing workers as resources.
Robert Owen (1771-1858) is referred to as the “Father of Socialism, Robert Owen
Communitarianism and the Cooperative Movement”; an entrepreneur, industrialist,
utopian, contributor to feminism, and trade union activist. Each of these “movements”
and roles claim Owen as a founder, yet what is not well documented or considered is the
link between his ideas and actions and modern human resource development (HRD).
Owen’s works and ideas predate modern HRD practices by almost two centuries,
yet many of the tenets of contemporary HRD mirror his approaches to worker 415
education, worker relations, social justice, and responsible leadership. He reduced
working hours, introduced factory on-site educational programs, developed a
cooperative learning community, and viewed work as a means for character
building and social reform, all while building financially successful firms within an
uncertain economy and a changing society.
Like most visionaries, Robert Owen was not without his detractors. Several of his
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

contemporaries saw him as an unrealistic utopian, an elitist, a “buffoon”, an


authoritarian with anti-democratic tendencies (Thompson, 1969), an impractical social
visionary (Taylor, 1995), and a despot trying to control society and workers through
benevolent paternalism. Regardless of his foibles and eccentricities, Owen’s views on
developing people and community-industry related cooperation were progressive and
are especially relevant to our understanding of today’s workforce and workplaces.
Examining and recognizing workplace pioneers like Robert Owen have several
important implications for human resource development. Studying history expands
our knowledge by encouraging the examination of the stability of the HRD
phenomenon (Lawrence, 1984). Examinations of historical figures are necessary to
close the gaps that exist with most documentable facts pertaining to complex events
and actions (Scott, 1996). HRD as a discipline should explore its past to understand its
present and to create core knowledge of the critical role that context plays in
developing human resources.
To appreciate and understand Owen’s life I explore the prevailing social and
economic conditions that influenced the development of his ideas and stimulated his
actions. Before detailing these influences the purpose, the rationale for the study and
the theory and methods used are discussed.

Purpose
To bring history to the forefront in HRD research and address how historical figures
inform current practices and concepts, I began to study Robert Owen in 1999. I set out
to examine his and others’ historical writings and artifacts to see if there was a
relationship between his ideas and endeavors and the human resource concepts upon
which contemporary workplaces are developed. This historiographic study is an effort
to provide evidence of Robert Owen as a pioneer of HRD.

Rationale and significance


The rationale for this research is situated within a historical framework of workplace
reform and the development of human resources. Knowledge of workplace reform and
how it is influenced by contexts is critical to develop ideas and interventions that make
positive changes on employees, leadership, organizations and society. Workplace
reform can also inform better relations between workers and management. Its basic
tenets match those of modern human resource development, namely cooperation and
EJTD communication between management and workers, skills development, diversity and
37,4 quality of work life.
In studying Robert Owen, the relationships between the nature of work and workers
and between workers, managers and business owners and the role that society plays in
workforce development and workplace reforms help us make comparisons across time
that can “illuminate the present by highlighting both what is recurrent and what is
416 new, what is durable, transient and contingent on our present conditions” (Brown,
1991, p. 1). As Bedeian (1998) said: “A discipline [HRD] that downplays or ignores the
cumulative impact of the past on its present fails to fully exploit the explanatory and
interpretive potential of understanding how and why present theories and methods
have their particular nature by virtue of the past” (p. 4).
This lack of a historical perspective contributes to the inability of HRD to define
itself (Lee, 2001) and to establish itself as a discipline (Hatcher, 1998). “Collective
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

historical memory serves as the basis for establishing the identity of a discipline”
(Carson and Carson, 1998, p. 38).
The present study is significant in a number of ways. First, it is one of only a few
empirical studies of Robert Owen as a pioneer in any work-related position (Butt, 1971).
Next, only a handful of historical studies of individuals related to HRM or personnel
management were located. The study is significant because only one publication was
found on the origins of HRD, namely Swanson’s (2001) work on Channing Dooley’s
contributions to training during the Second World War, and finally an extensive search
revealed no human resource development studies using a historiographic research method.
This study of Owen is also significant in helping HRD and related professionals
value what they are trying to create in modern workplaces through insights into what
has come before. Historical figures and their contexts can and should play a role in how
people are treated and developed within contemporary workplaces.

Conceptual foundation and method


The conceptual foundation for the present study suggests that historiographies can
inform the present; “individuals do significantly affect the course of events”, both
contemporary and in the future (Lockyear, 1984, p. 46) through reconstruction.
Reconstructionism was the epistemological foundation of the study. Characteristics of
reconstructionism include the “building blocks of validated sources, the origin and
context of each source, how the source is relevant to the research, and that
interrogation [albeit post hoc ] reveals truth” (Booth, 2005, p. 464).
Theoretically, I counter the postmodern criticism of work-related history as
unsupportive of “emancipatory discourse” (Jenkins, 1999) through knowledge that
(Popper, 1972) allows me to better understand the “real world/workplace” by providing
historical evidence that informs the emancipatory characteristics of the modern
workplace such as cooperation and employee development, attributes of Owen’s
approaches to the workplace, workers and society.
Historiography was chosen for this study because it provides a way for the
historian/researcher to understand the actor as well as the context of the action. Carson
and Carson (1998) added:
Historiographers strive to disentangle [. . .] motives through the difficult and somewhat
subjective technique of empathetic reconstruction [. . .] which requires [them] to enter the
minds and understand the feelings of the individual (p. 31).
Like many research methods, historiography begins with a general question, such as Robert Owen
“Is there historical evidence to establish Robert Owen as a pioneer of HRD?”. To
answer this question I examined primary sources including eye-witness accounts by
contemporaries or seminal publications by Owen and others. Secondary sources
provided views of journalists or scholars who later reconstruct the story (Handlin et al.,
1970). Each source was examined, authenticated, analyzed and its suitability as a
reliable source was evaluated (Handlin et al., 1970). 417
In the present study, in conjunction with an extensive literature, I examined
numerous primary and secondary sources during my visits from 1998 to 2005 to New
Lanark and Edinburgh, Scotland and New Harmony, Indiana and visits to Ireland and
Wales. I visited organizations known to hold Owen’s works, including the The
Workingman’s Institute and Library at New Harmony, IN, and the Owen Memorial
Museum in Newtown, Wales[1].
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

As I discovered ideas/concepts in one source I then sought confirming and/or


disconfirming evidences from other sources. As an example, an article in the Glasgow
Herald described worker’s responses to Owen’s return to his New Lanark mill after a long
absence traveling abroad: “Mr Owen is so justly beloved by all the inhabitants employed
at New Lanark” (Glasgow Herald, January 10, 1814). To confirm, I located discussions of
this event in several secondary sources such as Donnachie (2000) and Duncan (2004):
“Men, women and children were chanting his name [. . .] shouting their gratitude” (p. 210).
Many of my early interpretations were critiqued by the Honorable Hatton Davidson, past
Curator of the Robert Owen Memorial Museum located in Newtown, Wales.
The next section discusses the many contextual influences on Owen. It provides an
understanding of how he developed his thinking and drove his actions.

Contextual influences
With few exceptions, HRD-related research discounts the historical contexts in which
people live and work. This is unfortunate, because contextual factors such as
economics, politics and societal demands greatly influence workers and workplaces.
Wren (1987) suggested that an individual’s “contributions can only be evaluated in
light of the context of the times” (p. 341). HRD professionals can and should learn by
understanding the connections of contexts over time. A good example is a comparison
between the impact that the growth of technology during the British Industrial
Revolution had on the workplace with the technological explosion within US and
global organizations of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.
To better understand Robert Owen within the context in which he lived and worked,
it was necessary to examine biographical, historical and socio-economic contexts of the
British Industrial Revolution for the period 1790-1850 as the backdrop against which
his philosophy and principles were cultivated.

Early life
Robert Owen was born in 1771 in Newtown, Powys, in central Wales. Being Welsh
gave him a bilingual upbringing and education. Owen senior was a minor official and
local craftsman; thus, young Robert was expected to work at a young age (Claeys,
1993). Throughout his youth he had exceptional work experiences that developed in
him a unique combination of business competence and a vivid curiosity of the
environment in which people lived and worked.
EJTD From his varied work experiences and employer associations he expanded his
37,4 management capabilities and matured in his social skills, honesty, and autonomy.
From 1781 to 1785, McGuffog, a successful draper, employed, befriended and mentored
Robert in efficient business practices, how best to communicate with various
customers (Owen, 1857; Butt, 1971; Cole, 1930), and provided him with a “well selected
library”, which he “freely used” (Owen, 1857, p. 13) Readings included Seneca’s “Views
418 on Humanity”, a stoic philosophy that promotes the essential value of all people.
While working for a year in large retail firms in London, Owen began to appreciate
the frenetic retail business while the “slavery of every day” challenged his previous
views of the work environment. These early experiences were the foundation for his
burgeoning curiosity of the role of the environment in developing human character.
Owen left London for Manchester some time between 1786 and 1788[2].
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Immersion within the factory system


Manchester at the turn of the century was at the center of the British industrial
revolution and the heart of economic and social transformation. “The great inventions
of the late eighteenth century – Watt’s steam engine, the [Hargreaves] spinning jenny,
the [Arkwright] waterframe, and the [Crompton] mule – were enabling the industry to
swell to a huge size in a very short time” (Cole, 1930, p. 16). Podmore (1907) noted that
between 1780 and 1790 the population of Manchester doubled. Owen benefitted from
this growth. His success as a businessman grew exponentially. But it was the rapid
decline in living and working conditions of workers, their families, and especially
children, that captured Owen’s attention and concerns.
While technical innovations improved the processes of production, and the factory
system challenged management, it was two “great systems of thought – economic
science and socialism” (Toynbee, 1957) that came together in Manchester that
ultimately shaped Owen’s concepts, philosophies, writings and actions. British society
was also growing more capitalistic, while the state reduced restrictions and laws that
had heretofore hampered economic activity. This provided some of the changes
necessary for industrial entrepreneurs like Owen to succeed.
For the next few years he worked for Satterfield and Co., drapers and silk retailers
(1788-1791). With his new partner and machine maker John (or Ernest) Jones he became
an employer making machines, “technically called ‘mules’ for spinning cotton”. Only a
few months later, Owen found himself as an entrepreneur having severed his relations
with Jones in late 1791 (Podmore, 1907). Making a tidy profit after less than a year on
his own, a new opportunity presented itself to the 20-year-old Owen[2].
In the fall of 1792 the Bank Top Mill, a large “most up to date plant producing some
of the finest yarn yet manufactured” lost its long-time manager (Donnachie, 2000). The
owner, Peter Drinkwater, a leading figure in Manchester’s merchant elite, offered the
young Owen the job. For the next year he improved overall quality, rearranged the
factory to address “defects in the various processes”, and paid as much attention to the
500 men, women and children, what he called the “living machinery”, as he did the
“dead” (Owen, 1816a, b). Drinkwater’s previous “concerns about the morals and
conditions of his workforce” encouraged Robert to change the rules of worker conduct,
and to set standards for health and sanitation, thus “winning the goodwill of the
workers” (Podmore, 1907, p. 46), and creating an “orderly and disciplined”
state-of-the-art factory. His concerns about the morals and conditions of the
workforce he would later emulate and expand upon at New Lanark. Through Robert Owen
improvements in productivity and quality he also increased profits by 50 percent
(Chaloner, 1954).
Beyond his success as a manager and his early explorations into workplace reform,
Owen’s encounters with the chaos of technical, economic and social issues coalescing in
Manchester provided him with intellectual stimulation that reinforced his growing
concerns about the negative impact of the factory system on workers and society. 419
As a successful cotton spinner and “public celebrity” of some limited note, Owen
was invited in 1793 to join a group of intellectuals with “like-minded” concerns about
social conditions: the distinguished “manifestation of the Enlightenment”, the
Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society. The young Owen was immediately
inspired by a unique mix of moral philosophy, scientific theory and concerns with
societal transformation. From the atomic theories of Dalton, Robert Fulton’s
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

mechanical genius, to the philosophy of Samuel Taylor Coleridge it is “hardly an


exaggeration to say that of the leading minds at the end of the eighteenth century [. . .]
interested in new developments in society a high proportion were associated with the
Society” (Cole, 1953, p. 19). Robert presented papers on “The Utility of Learning” and
“Thoughts of the Connection between Universal Happiness and Practical Mechanics”,
helping to develop his views on the influence of environment and education in shaping
character. While in Manchester he discovered that there was a “significant” link
between the ideas on the state of the poor, child labor and social reform and practical
applications he would later attempt (Donnachie, 2000).
There is little doubt that his association with the Society changed his world views
and was “of much value to Owen in later life” (Podmore, 1907). But, it was his
relationship with its founder, Dr Thomas Percival, that instilled in him deep concerns
for conditions of factories and the health and well-being of those who worked in them.
Podmore added that it was this association that “determined the bent of his whole
future life and work” (Podmore, 1907, p. 60).
Philosophers William Godwin and Jeremy Bentham had significant sway over on
the development of Owen’s ideals. Owen undoubtedly read William Godwin’s Political
Justice (Godwin, 1793), which outlined a new social order of equity and justice. “A New
View of Society” contained many of Godwin’s ideas and sometimes even the actual
phrasing (Podmore, 1907; Cole, 1953). The famous philosopher and social reformer
Jeremy Bentham was a partner in New Lanark. Historians believe that his “greatest
happiness of the greatest number” utilitarianism influenced Owen’s concerns for the
social problems of the factory system and public education.
In 1795 he left Drinkwater and went into the first of what was to be several partnerships
with Quaker businessmen, one of which was in the Chorlton Twist Company. His
associations with Quakers furthered his ideals about ethics and social justice.
It was also at this time that Owen first visited the New Lanark in Scotland and entered
into negotiations with its owners Arkwright and David Dale to purchase the
well-established and profitable New Lanark mill. Within a few years (1799) Owen married
Dale’s daughter Caroline, and in 1800 became New Lanark’s manager and part owner.

New Lanark: Owen’s great experiment


New Lanark was a factory village housing 2,000 people and consisting of several
manufacturing buildings, worker and family residences, village stores, workshops, and
EJTD schools. The village was set along the picturesque Falls of the Clyde, which provided
37,4 required water power to the mills. Owen established New Lanark “not merely a success
as a [for profit] factory, but the laboratory for a great series of social experiments in
education and moral and physical reform” (Cole, 1930, p. 69) and as an experiment in
linking financial success with workplace reforms.
New Lanark was “then one of the largest enterprises of its kind in the world”
420 (Donnachie, 2000, p. 97) with over 1,200 workers. From 1800 until 1827, when he sold
the firm, New Lanark was a factory dedicated to work reforms and social betterment
through what Owen called a “new view of work and community” while simultaneously
enhancing productivity, efficiency and profit (Owen, 1816a, b).
In most factories of the time working conditions were appalling. In the last quarter
of the eighteenth century child labor was an acceptable practice. A child as young as
five had to endure long hours in dark, poorly ventilated and dirty mills where safety
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

standards were non-existent and where many were killed or maimed by accidents.
Owen was dismayed by this treatment. He said that factory owners must “be aware of
the injustice and useless cruelty, inflicted upon the most helpless in our society” (Owen,
1818, p. 132). He was determined to solve the problem of child labor and in 1815
introduced a bill that called for a reduction in work hours.
While he did adjust hours, breaks and conditions, the reality is that Owen changed
work hours only minimally. In his Second Essay, he wrote: “But it was absolutely
necessary that the children be employed from six o’clock in the morning till seven in
the evening” (Owen, 1813). Work hours for child labor at New Lanark were still fewer
than those required by his fellow industrialists.
Owen realized that the implications of industrialism were not confined to physical
changes, but also the cause of grave social dilemmas that not only ruined people’s
well-being but also oppressed the character of society. He sought to reform the factory
system and how it negatively influenced the lives of people through social experiments
with education and community development. For many of his colleagues these
measures were not unique, but were rather an example of “enlightened management”,
grounded on hard actuarial and financial principles. “The whole operation [New
Lanark] could never be mistaken for anything other than what it was: a profit-making
cotton mill” (Harrison, 1969, p. 155). But New Lanark was more than a factory. It was
also a genuine attempt at community organization (Harrison, 1969). Owen strongly
believed in what he was trying to accomplish at New Lanark. He attempted to influence
his fellow businessmen through his focus more on human than material capital. In his
address to the Superintendents of Manufactories (1816) he said:
Will you not afford some of your attention to consider whether a portion of your time and
capital would not be more advantageously applied to improve your living machines? [. . .] I
venture to assure you that your time and money so applied, if directed by a true knowledge of
the subject, would return you not five, ten or fifteen percent, for your capital so expended, but
often fifty and in many cases a hundred percent (Owen, 1816a; cited in Gorb, 1951, p. 137).
Although an advocate of new technologies, Owen was against the loss of social
standing and humanity that was evidenced by rampant industrialism. He wrote in his
Report to the County of Lanark . . ., that technology had “inflicted evils on society
which now greatly overbalance the benefits which are derived from them”. He argued
that the wealth of a few was “produced by the industry of the many” (Owen, 1821). In a
pamphlet containing three letters, entitled Mr Owen’s Proposed Arrangements,
London, 1819, he proposed to the famous economist David Ricardo that abysmal Robert Owen
social conditions could be significantly changed not by revolution, but rather by
rational behavior. He stated that “famine, crime, poverty, and general misery could be
repressed by increasing the means of subsistence”, through his “village scheme [. . .]
self-support” and humane work (Owen, 1819, pp. 21-2).
The prevailing economic theory of value, i.e. the argument that prices of commodities
are determined by the hours of labor expended in their production attributed to David 421
Ricardo, the famous economist was challenged by Owen by demonstrating that a
company could make a good profit by treating its (human capital) employees well.
“Indeed, he would argue that it was by the very act of breaking Ricardo’s ‘iron law of
wages’ that he had made his workers more productive” (O’Toole, 1996, p. 203).
Throughout his career he used his status as factory owner to question authority and
push for reforms. Owen worked diligently to influence the British government to
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

transform child labor laws and amend existing Poor Laws. His ideas on using flexible
work hours and using half-day work and half-day school schemes for young workers
were finally included in a much diluted Factory Act of 1844.
The uniqueness of the great technological, economic and social changes brought on
by the Industrial Revolution shaped and molded an utterly unconventional individual
in Robert Owen. Without historical contexts our ability to relate Owen’s ideas and
actions to modern HRD is debatable and thus little more than polemic.

Linking Owen to contemporary HRD


The following is a discussion of the themes that emerged from the present research
that specifically connects Owen’s ideals and actions with modern concepts of human
resource development. The themes are:
.
managing people and profit;
.
education and training;
.
pioneering workplace innovations; and
.
from factory owner to “social father”: new harmony and beyond (see Table I for a
summary).

Managing people and profit


Owen was a shrewd and smart manufacturer. He was financially successful through a
combination of technical and managerial abilities and entrepreneurial expertise. But it
was the shift in his focus from running a factory to nurturing his workers that places
him at the forefront of human resource development. Large-scale owners of factories
and employers of labor became “less makers of goods than managers of resources and
entrepreneurial expertise” (Brown, 1991, p. 295).
While Owen was not the first paternal industrialist, he was certainly the most
recognized factory system capitalist to practice “effective leadership as a matter of
communicating a vision, not barking orders” (O’Toole, 1996, p. 204). His visionary
leadership included prohibiting corporal punishment and training superintendents in
humanitarian disciplinary practices. And while the factory owners of the time “made
their money out of slavery and other forms of worker exploitation” (Donnachie, 2000,
p. 127), Owen sought reforms through humane measures, and although criticized as
being paternalistic, many observed his empathetic and humane leadership.
EJTD
Owen’s actions/concepts HRD actions/concepts
37,4
Relation of economics to work and focus on Workers as assets/economic impact of work on
labor not machines society
Focus on relationship between maintenance of Systems thinking, process control
machines and health and safety of people and
422 profit
Allowing for workers to make decisions and Empowerment, justice
question authority
Less child labor Human rights
Infant schools Education and training
Community care/reform of the factory system Social responsibility and humanitarian workplaces
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Education (child and adult) Education and training, tenets of andragogy


Replaced management using violence with Organization behavior, Theory X and Theory Y,
reason and empathy (paternalism and Hawthorne studies
benevolence)
Workers as humans, not commodities Workers are resources/assets and part of
workplace community
Table I. Community and communitarianism (he was Teamwork, community of practice, social
Summary of the ahead of HRD and most current leaders) responsibility
connections between
Owen’s actions/concepts Cooperation Partnerships, community of practice
and modern HRD Utopianism Visioning

Owen also understood the importance of communication and empowerment. Workers


had the “right to appeal to Owen regarding the assessments made of them by
superintendents” (Donnachie, 2000, p. 82) and within the factory community employees
and their families had a “representative government” (Podmore, 1907, p. 88).
In his autobiography, Owen stated “My intentions were to commence a new system
of management on principles of justice and kindness”, and admitted that his
innovations were partly humanitarian and partly improved efficiency (Owen, 1857).
His dedication to justice was evidenced when he continued to pay wages for up to four
months during a plant shut-down in response to a cotton embargo (Podmore, 1907,
p. 84). The workers who had been employed by Dale, the previous owner “could not
possibly have guessed how much better their lives were to change for the better over
the next 25 years” (New Lanark Conservation Trust, n.d.b, p. 12). “Most visitors, and
even the critics, remarked on the regularity and good order maintained by New
Lanark’s management – with or without Owen’s presence” (Donnachie, 2000, p. 157).
Early industrialists faced problems of labor disputes and labor discipline; Owen
believed that an egalitarian, non-competitive social community provided a solution. In
this system machinery did not supplant or devalue human labor, but rather reduced
work hours and disagreeable types of work. He believed that a stable life and work
environment would help to develop individual character. In his “New View of Society”,
he said:
This experiment at New Lanark was the first commencement of practical measures with a
view to change the fundamental principle on which society has heretofore been based from
the beginning; and no experiment could be more successful in proving the truth of the Robert Owen
principle that the character is formed for and not by the individual, and that society now
possesses the most ample means and power to well form the character of everyone (Owen,
1813-1816)

Education and training


Owen placed education at the top of social and workplace reforms. The good society 423
and productive citizens are not achievable because of ignorance that can only be
removed by education (Owen, 1816a, b). He stated: “All men are erroneously trained at
present, and hence the inconsistencies and misery of the world” (Owen, 1816), and that
“education was not only the antidote for the ills of society but the basis of good living
[. . .] and good work” (Cole, 1925, p 127).
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Although his approach to paternalistic management was not unique, Owen’s ideas
about education tied to economics and benefitting workers was unconventional. He
suggested that education benefits children when they grow up to be “industrious [. . .]
and faithful to employers” (Owen, 1857; McLaren, 2000). In a speech in Glasgow, in
1812 he declared: “Much has been said and written in relation to education, but few
persons are yet aware of its real importance in society [. . .] as the primary source of all
good and evil, misery and happiness” (Glasgow Herald, April 20, 1812; cited in
Harrison, 1969).
At New Lanark, through his Essays on the Formation of Character (1812-1814) and
in papers he presented at his Institute for the Formation of Character, attention was
devoted to the role of education and training, which had proved vital in removing
“unfavorable circumstances” (Donnachie, 2000, p. 118). The Institution was a factory
school for children by day and a lecture hall or dance hall for adult workers in the
evenings. It had a central role “highlighting the importance of relaxation to the
workforce” (Owen, 1857; Donnachie, 2000, p. 118) and “a center for adult education and
recreation” (Harrison, 1969, p. 160).
In his Report to the County of Lanark (Glasgow, 1821), Owen stated: “It is only by
education, rightly understood, that communities [. . .] can ever be well governed, and by
means of such education every object of human society will be attained with the least
labour and the most satisfaction” (Owen, 1821; cited in Silver, 1969, p. 184). For Owen,
education was to train citizens for a new moral world. The school was “greatly superior
to the mechanical instruction of the age” and “adapted to the capacities” of the learner
(Harrison, 1968, p. 30).
Owen’s New Lanark Institute was a mixture of educational ideas from Lancastrian
and Pestalozzian principles. It is ironic that even though many of his “ideas on
education were no doubt derived from Pestalozzi” (Podmore, 1907, p. 129), education at
New Lanark did not include “any kind of craft or constructional work” (Cole, 1953,
p. 83), or vocational training per se, yet Pestalozzi’s concepts were the foundation of
modern vocational education.
Educational innovations within the Institute are perhaps more illustrative of
learning theories such as the experiential learning theory of Kolb and Fry (1975) and
Knowles’s (1990) andragogy. For example, children were taught to develop their own
style; that they understood what they were learning and why, and that they applied
what they learned. Owen believed that education should be by “practical application
and clear understanding of subject matter (Altfest, 1977, p. 83). Learners were “always
EJTD allowed to ask their own questions for explanations” (Owen, 1857). Anderson (2002)
37,4 added that “Owen’s plan calls for students to share the responsibilities for teaching; in
doing so, he [Owen] blurs the distinctions on which hierarchies are built” (p. 431).
Owen instilled the novel idea of learning as an integral part of a happy, egalitarian,
work-based community. The Institute served the purpose not only as education for
children but also as enhancing the character of workers. From A New View of Society
424 (1816), Owen’s experiment at New Lanark was “Reform in the training and in the
management of the poor, the ignorant, the untaught and the untrained”. Education was
but one component, albeit an important one, of a larger social agenda that proposed
and highlighted Owen’s New Lanark as a model solution to the evils caused by poverty
and early industrialism.
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Pioneering workplace innovations


Not all of Owen’s workplace changes were exceptional, but others were. He supported
workplace diversity through opportunities for female employment. Two-thirds of his
New Lanark workforce were women. Owen conceived society and a workplace “where
women should be accorded the same rights and privileges as men” (Owen, 1821). To
most nineteenth-century industrialists this was unthinkable. Female workers were
targets of abuse. A visitor to a mill remarked: “the place was full of women, young, all
of them, some large with child, and obliged to stand twelve hours a day [. . .] the heat
was excessive, the stink perstiferous[. . .] I nearly fainted” (Pollard, 1999, p. 215). In
addition to maintaining oppressive working conditions, “mill owners and their sons
freely had their lascivious way with female employees” (Rule, 1986, p. 199).
Owen felt that competitive factory systems kept women at a disadvantage, an
inequality reinforced by crude stereotypes (Brown, 1991, p. 359). Owen’s concern with
the emancipation of women led him to devise communal dining-rooms and schools that
“lightened the burden of child rearing” (Owen, 1821). Provisions were also made for
cultural diversity within the New Lanark community. Dual signage, supervisor
training and other provisions were offered to accommodate Gaelic speakers.
Owen also explored the relationship between attitudes and performance, what we
know today as behavior modification. A wooden block with sides painted different
colors known as the “Silent Monitor” was placed adjacent to a worker. The color
provided immediate feedback on acceptable behaviors. Owen also cautioned his
workforce against the use of foul language and drunkenness and used strict discipline
only when absolutely needed.
An early proponent of manufacturing “flow”, Owen understood and trained his
workers on routine equipment maintenance and factory cleanliness and “orderliness”.
The loss of No. 3 Mill in 1819 to fire caused a renewed focus on fire prevention and
safety throughout the factory and an interest in general health throughout the entire
New Lanark community.
Owen was an early innovator of what we know today as organizational
commitment. His use of “branding” through development and marketing of a “Picture
Yarn”, a yarn with a print of the mill, “helped create what we would describe as a
‘corporate image’, not just aimed at his customers but giving his labour force pride in
their work and community” (Donnachie, 2000, p. 161; Butt, 1971).
Other workplace innovations included fluctuating working hours, and refusing to
employ children under the age of ten (child labor from five to ten years of age was
common). Unlike his fellow factory owners Owen did not see a child of seven as “a little Robert Owen
adult and therefore like other labour, a suitable instrument of gain; but as a human
being in a distinct phase of life” (Harrison, 1969, p. 161). As a humanistic manager he
stopped the commonly used “forced labor” by forbidding the beating and physical
punishment of his workers.
Improvements in the quality of work life that are still considered innovative today
were in evidence at New Lanark. For example, a “sickness and superannuation fund” 425
was maintained, and free medical services were available (Harrison, 1969). Owen
provided more than adequate family housing. The paving of streets was followed by a
system of street cleaning and extermination of pests by groups of “bug hunters” (New
Lanark Conservation Trust, n.d.b), although these exterminators were unpopular to
some workers’ families. The company stores sold quality goods at reasonable prices.
Owen reduced the costs of staples for his employees and their families 25 percent, yet
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

the stores made an average profit of £700 annually. Profit was reinvested in
maintenance of the factory schools (Podmore, 1907; Morton, 1962).
And while not all of his workers embraced his reforms, a majority apparently cared
deeply for him. In 1813, after a trip to meet with new Quaker partners, upon his return
to New Lanark the community unharnessed Owen’s horses from his carriage and
“drew him in triumph through the streets” (Harrison, 1969).
Many of his workers appeared to adore him, and visitors to New Lanark celebrated
his success as a manager and owner. However, veneration of Robert was far from
unanimous. Robert Southey, a friend and person of note visited New Lanark in 1819, and
reported that “the persons under him [. . .] aare as much under his absolute management
as so many slaves” (Southey, 1891; cited in New Lanark Conservation Trust n.d.a) and,
according to Robertson (1971, p. 150; cited in Pollard and Salt, 1971) his attempt at moral
improvement was “imposed upon workers without consultation” (p. 150). Even the
buildings, structures and Institutes were criticized as “symbolism of the early welfare
state; the bell turret reminds me of workhouses, the Institutes reminds me of orphanages,
and the mills could just as easily be Poor Law infirmaries” (Barker, 1998, pp. 127-32).
Owen’s single-minded focus to create a new view of work and society at New
Lanark insulated him to some extent from the sting of his critics. He was much more
interested in envisioning a workplace utopia and experimenting with his ideals of a
just society than conforming to the narrow-mindedness of many of his contemporaries.
He chose not to diminish his vision by clinging to the status quo.

From factory owner to “social father”: new harmony and beyond


By 1824 the lack of much significant progress at New Lanark in realizing his vision,
coupled with strained relations with his partners over his increasingly liberal views on
religion and education, Owen came “to the conclusion that a cotton mill and its
attendant factory village was an inadequate base from which to usher in the
millennium” (Harrison, 1969, p. 163). Owen was a secular millennialist who judged
community more important than the individual; the collective should ignore politics
and attempt to curtail economic problems (millennialists believed that historical events
such as the French Revolution would fundamentally change society toward a utopian
“golden age”). Its primary tenet was to “revolt against the dominant orthodoxies of
society” (Harrison, 1969, p. 63). Owen’s attention and energies shifted from business to
creating a utopian society.
EJTD In 1824 Owen visited the USA and recognized its potential as “a new fertile soil –
37,4 new for material and mental growth – the cradle of the future liberty of the human
race” (Owen, 1825). His social reform ideas were well received by John Adams, James
Monroe, Thomas Jefferson and many other leading reformers and politicians. It was
during these initial visits to America that Owen began his search for his new utopia. He
found the future home of his soon-to-be doomed social experiment along the Wabash
426 River in Indiana.
Owen purchased Harmony, Indiana from its founder Father George Rapp in 1825,
renamed it New Harmony and invited “the industrious and well-disposed of all
nations” to come and play their part in establishing a new order of society (Owen, 1825;
Harrison, 1969, p. 275; cited in Cole, 1930).
As its population grew, New Harmony experienced housing shortages, a dearth of
skilled labor (Bestor, 1950), and difficulties obtaining goods, since most had to be made
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

on site or procured with great difficulty. Dissention grew in the winter of 1825-1826
with the arrival of Owen’s “Boatload of Knowledge”, a group of intellectuals, educators
and aristocrats who arrived by keelboat from Philadelphia. They were secured to run
the schools and provide intellectual, moral and communitarian leadership. Bestor
(1950) reported that the “cleavage between the so-called Literati and the rest of the
community’s members produced the deepest and most enduring division” (p. 179). As
New Harmony continued to decline, Owen’s transformation from a manager to a
“utopian prince” (Duncan, 2004) was complete.
Continuing economic, social and organizational problems and the intense stresses of
pioneer life took their toll. As a communitarian experiment New Harmony “virtually
came to an end with Owen’s departure in June, 1827” (Harrison, 1969, p. 165). He
returned to Great Britain that same year. He never saw New Harmony again.
As he grew older, more socialistic and radical Owen became a leading figure for
working class institutions and cooperative worker and trade movements such as the
Grand National Moral Union of the Productive and Useful Classes and the Grand
National Consolidated Trades Union.
During the last two decades of his life Owen spent his time lecturing, writing and
working on sectarian doctrines and government reforms while living on a meager
income. Robert Owen died in 1858 at the age of 87 pursuing spiritualism, a belief he
had bitterly admonished most of his life.
“It was an uninspiring end for a man whose influence was so great in many
movements which were not to achieve fruition until recent times [. . .] he attributed much
importance to the ethical principles and social ideas which he felt pay as the basis of any
organization” (Gorb, 1951, p. 147) which he found antithetical to business of his time.

Discussion and conclusions


Historiographers draw conclusions not from empirical data and statistical processes
but from “impressionistic analysis where conclusions are more on narratives that
capture mood, feelings, underlying thoughts and motivations” (Topolski, 1991; Carson
and Carson, 1998, p. 31). This research highlighted the ideas, thoughts and work of
Robert Owen, whose “application of certain principles of business conduct, of
education and human organization, were startlingly modern” (Gorb, 1951, p. 128). The
innovations he cultivated and implemented provide evidence that a focus on workers’
moral character and community environment coupled with humane management leads
to more productive and “happier” workers and families. He demonstrated that social Robert Owen
ills can be addressed through “benevolent leadership”, work-based social innovations
and community-based education. Owen’s writings and actions suggested that he
understood education and training were keys to pull workers from destitution and
forced slavery, to create a new community-based work environment and thus to
contribute to economic and social conditions (Gorb, 1951).
Owen, like few of his contemporaries operated on the principle that the working 427
conditions/environment of employees should not be compromised for the sake of profit.
“Few masters of business affairs concerned themselves with the welfare of the people
or with the solution of social problems as did the cotton spinner of New Lanark”
(Branigin, 1972, p. 18).
Although a workplace and social reformer, Owen was a contemporary of the
paternalism practiced by industrialists of the time portraying him as unable to have a
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

personal and reciprocal relationship with his workers “whose lives he wanted
passionately to improve” (Anderson, 2002, p. 427). As an aristocratic factory owner he
was expected to be detached from the lower classes.
While there is some evidence that Owen did not associate himself much with his
workers and saw them in a detached, fatherly way, he admonished his fellow
industrialists for referring to workers as “bad, worthless and wicked” (“Address to the
inhabitants of New Lanark”; Owen, 1816a, b).
Another way to see Owen’s relationship with his workers is as a precedent of
organizational culture and socialization. In his Third Essay (Owen, 1814) he observes
that people are “trained and formed by its leading existing, and the character of the
lower orders in Britain is now formed chiefly by trade, manufacturers, and commerce”
(Anderson, 2002, p. 426). In “A New View of Society” (Owen, 1816a, b), he stated:
To remedy this evil, not one legal punishment was inflicted, not one individual imprisoned; but
checks and other regulations of prevention were introduced; a short plain explanation of the
immediate benefits they would derive from a different conduct was inculcated by those
instructed for the purpose [. . .] Those employed became industrious, temperate, healthy; faithful
to their employers, and kind to each other, while the owners received benefits far beyond those
which could be obtained by any other means than those of mutual confidence and kindness.
And even if he was less than “democratic” as a leader, he was within the political
debates of the time among those who pressed the hardest for civic and human rights
for the lower working class (Tsuzuki, 1992).
The present study identified Owen’s visions and actions to achieve greater
autonomy and justice in the workplace, and the optimistic belief that this goal and
more can be achieved through the creation of a positive work community. Owenism,
the notion that humans can find ideal solutions to the complex problems of society and
the workplace, has been supplanted by labels such as “visionary” and “socially
responsible”, accolades and monikers for leaders who work for the betterment of
organizations and society (O’Toole, 1996).

Implications for human resource development


This original research contributes to HRD research and practice in four ways:
(1) It provides historical support for the ideals of Owenism as part of the history of
modern workplace concepts such as diversity, equality and learning.
EJTD (2) Robert Owen (1771-1858) pioneered workplace reforms and workplace justice and
37,4 social responsibility, common ideas in modern workplaces and management
concepts. Owen believed that all people are educable and have potential “Not only
business but society at large was to regard the working man as a person who
could be developed to a point where he could contribute to the improvement of
economic and social conditions. In his experiment with education associated with
428 work, Owen anticipated a concept which only in recent times has been accepted
by managers as part of his approach to administration” (Gorb, 1951, p. 144).
Owen believed in and experimented with the idea that the workplace should be
part of, not separated from the community. The applicability of Owenism,
communitarianism and to a lesser extent utopianism, has inspired leaders to
visualize and promote a humane and equitable workplace and focus on human
potential versus human chattel. The common thread in these perspectives is the
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

desire to achieve greater autonomy and human rights in the workplace, and the
optimistic belief that this goal can be achieved through development of human
resources and related workplace reforms towards a new kind of organization
where financial success is a result of developing human potential.
(3) Historiography as a research method has potential for HRD research. It should be
considered a supplement to more traditional research techniques, especially in
areas where methods are required to assess multiple causes from multiple
time-bound contexts. Indeed, researchers may benefit for the creativity, skepticism,
and reticence demanded by historiography (Goodman and Kruger, 1988).
(4) Finally, on tracing the origins of our current thinking on matters of humane
workplaces and developing human potential on the job, we can see that Owen’s
work and ideas as a businessman and workplace reformer an early attempt to
integrate a set of social and ethical ideas into a socio-workplace framework that
linked the development of human resources with social reforms.

The evidence cited herein suggests that Robert Owen implemented and enhanced
many of today’s HRD-related activities and concepts. He was one of the first recognized
business leaders to focus on employees and their well-being and the relationship
between work and society. Thus, Robert Owen should be considered and accepted as a
true pioneer of human resource development.

Notes
1. My sincere appreciation to the Hon. Hatton Davidson, past Curator of the Robert Owen
Museum, Newtown, Powys, Wales for his hospitality during my visit in 2002 and his
thoughtful critique of an earlier draft of this manuscript.
2. Some dates are inconsistent within the historical record.

References
Altfest, K.C. (1977), Robert Owen as Educator, Twayne Publishers, Boston, MA.
Anderson, R. (2002), “Misery made me a fiend: social reproduction in Mary Shelley’s
Frankenstein and Robert Owen’s early writings”, Nineteenth-Century Contexts, Vol. 24,
pp. 417-438.
Barker, P. (1998), “In New Lanark Robert Owen tried to forge a new society. Today, his model Robert Owen
village is a visitor center”, New Statesman, Vol. 127, pp. 4-6.
Bedeian, A. (1998), “Exploring the past”, Journal of Management History, Vol. 4, pp. 4-15.
Bestor, A. (1950), Backwoods Utopias: The Sectarian Origins and the Owenite Phase of
Communitarianism Socialism in America: 1663-1829, University of Pennsylvania Press,
Philadelphia, PA.
Booth, D. (2005), “Evidence revisited: interpreting historical materials in sport history”, 429
Rethinking History, Vol. 9 No. 4, pp. 459-483.
Branigin, R.D. (1972), “Robert Owen’s New Harmony: an American heritage”, in Pitzer, D.E. (Ed.),
Robert Owen’s American Legacy, Proceedings of the Robert Owen Bicentennial Conference,
Vol. 18, Indiana Historical Society, Indianapolis, IN, p. 22.
Brown, R. (1991), Society and Economy in Modern Britain 1700-1850, Routledge, London.
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Butt, J. (1971), Robert Owen: Prince of Cotton Spinners, David & Charles, Newton Abbot.
Carson, P.P. and Carson, K.D. (1998), “Theoretically grounding management history as a relevant
and valuable form of knowledge”, Journal of Management History, Vol. 4 No. 1, pp. 29-42.
Chaloner, W.H. (1954), “Robert Owen, Peter Drinkwater and the early factory system in
Manchester, 1788-1800”, Memoirs and Proceedings of the Manchester Literary and
Philosophical Society, Vol. LXXXII.
Claeys, G. (1993), The Selected Works of Robert Owen, The Pickering Masters, Vol. 4 vols,
Pickering and Chatto, London.
Cole, G.D.H. (1925), Robert Owen, Little, Brown and Company, London.
Cole, G.D.H. (1930), The Life of Robert Owen, Macmillan, London.
Cole, M. (1953), Robert Owen of New Lanark, Oxford University Press, New York, NY.
Donnachie, I. (2000), Robert Owen: Owen of New Lanark and New Harmony, Tuckwell Press,
Edinburgh.
Duncan, F.H. (2004), The Utopian Prince: Robert Owen and the Search for Millennium, Xlibris,
Bloomington, IN.
Galenson, D. (1981), White Servitude in Colonial America: An Economic Analysis, Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge.
Godwin, W. (1793), Political Justice, Vol. I.
Goodman, R.S. and Kruger, E.J. (1988), “Data dredging or legitimate research method?
Historiography and its potential for management research”, Academy of Management
Review, Vol. 13, pp. 315-325.
Gorb, P. (1951), “Robert Owen as a businessman”, Bulletin of the Business Historical Society,
Vol. 25, pp. 127-148.
Handlin, O., Schlesinger, A.M., Morison, S.E., Merk, F., Schlesinger, A.M. Jr and Buck, P.H.
(1970), Harvard Guide to American History, Atheneum, New York, NY.
Harrison, J.F.C. (1968), Utopianism and Education: Robert Owen and the Owenites, Teachers
College Press, Columbia University, New York, NY.
Harrison, J.F.C. (1969), Robert Owen and the Owenites in Britain and America: The Quest for the
New Moral World, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.
Hatcher, T. (1998), “An alternative view of human resource development”, in Stewart, B. and
Hall, H. (Eds), Beyond Tradition: Preparing HRD Educators for Tomorrow’s Workforce,
University Council for Workforce and Human Resource Development, Columbia, MO,
pp. 33-54.
EJTD Jenkins, K. (1999), “After history”, Rethinking History, Vol. 3, pp. 7-20.
37,4 Kolb, D.A. and Fry, R. (1975), “Toward an applied theory of experiential learning”, in Cooper, C.
(Ed.), Theories of Group Process, Wiley, London.
Knowles, M.S. (1990), The Adult Learner: A Neglected Species, Gulf Publishing, Houston, TX.
Lawrence, B.S. (1984), “Historical perspective: using the past to study the present”, Academy of
Management Review, Vol. 9, pp. 307-312.
430 Lee, M. (2001), “A refusal to define HRD”, Human Resource Development International, Vol. 3,
pp. 327-341.
Morton, A.L. (1962), The Life and Ideas of Robert Owen, Lawrence and Wishart, London.
Lockyear, R. (1984), “Writing history: Roger Lockyear on writing historical biography”, History
Today, November, pp. 46-49.
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

McLaren, D.J. (2000), “Education of citizenship and the new moral world of Robert Owen”,
Scottish Educational Review, Vol. 32 No. 2, pp. 107-117.
New Lanark Conservation Trust (n.d.a), South Lanarkshire Education Resources, New Lanark
Conservation Trust, New Lanark.
New Lanark Conservation Trust (n.d.b), “Journey of a Tour of Scotland”, Robert Southey, 1891,
cited in Investigating New Lanark 1785-1830, New Lanark Conservation Trust, New
Lanark.
O’Toole, J. (1996), Leading Change: The Argument for Values-based Leadership, Ballantine
Books, New York, NY.
Owen, R. (1813), A New View of Society: Or, Essays on the Principle of the Formation of Human
Character, (2nd Essay), London.
Owen, R. (1814), A New View of Society: Or, Essays on the Principle of the Formation of Human
Character, (3rd Essay), London.
Owen, R. (1816a), A New View of Society: Or, Essays on the Principle of the Formation of Human
Character, 2nd edition of the complete work, London.
Owen, R. (1816b), A New View of Society: Or, Essays on the Principle of the Formation of Human
Character, address to the Superintendants of manufactories, prefixed to the Third Essay
on the Formation of Character, London, pp. 71-74.
Owen, R. (1818), Observations on the Effect of the Manufacturing System: With Hints for the
Improvement of Those Parts of It Which Are Most Injurious to Health and Morals, 3rd ed.,
London.
Owen, R. (1819), “Mr. Owen’s proposed arrangement for the distressed working classes, shown to
be consistent with sound principles of political economy”, Three Letters Addressed to
David Ricardo, London.
Owen, R. (1821), Report to the County of Lanark of a Plan for Relieving Public Distress and
Removing Discontent, Glasgow, Scotland.
Owen, R. (1857), Life of Robert Owen. Written by Himself. With Selections from his Writings and
Correspondence, London.
Podmore, F. (1907), Robert Owen: A Biography, Haskell House, New York, NY.
Pollard, S. (1999), Labour History and the Labour Movement in Britain, Ashgate, Aldershot.
Pollard, S. and Salt, J. (1971), Robert Owen Prophet of the Poor: Essays in Honour of the Two
Hundredth Anniversary of his Birth, Macmillan, London.
Popper, K. (1972), The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.
Robertson, A.J. (1971), “Robert Owen, cotton spinner: New Lanark, 1800-25”, in Pollard, S. and Robert Owen
Salt, J. (Eds), Robert Owen Prophet of the Poor: Essays in Honour of the Two Hundredth
Anniversary of his Birth, Macmillan, London, pp. 145-165.
Rule, L. (1986), The Laboring Classes in Early Industrial England 1750-1850, Longman, London.
Scott, W.G. (1996), “Do historical facts speak for themselves”, Journal of Management History,
Vol. 2 No. 9, pp. 85-89.
Silver, H. (1969), Robert Owen on Education, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. 431
Swanson, R.A. (2001), “Origins of contemporary human resource development”, Advances in
Developing Human Resources, Vol. 3 No. 2.
Taylor, A. (1995), “New views of an old moral world: an appraisal of Robert Owen”, Labor
History, Vol. 36 No. 1, pp. 88-94.
Thompson, M. (1969), “Making of the English working class”, in Morton, A.L. (Ed.), The English
Downloaded by East Tennessee State University At 05:18 25 June 2016 (PT)

Utopia, Lawrence and Wishart, London, pp. 169-182.


Topolski, J. (1991), “Towards an integrated model of historical explanation”, History and Theory,
Vol. 39 No. 3, p. 330.
Toynbee, A. (1957), The Industrial Revolution, Beacon, London.
Tsuzuki, C. (1992), Robert Owen and the World of Co-operation, Robert Owen Association of
Japan, Tokyo.
Wren, D.A. (1987), “Management history: issues and ideas for teaching and research”, Journal of
Management, Vol. 13 No. 2, pp. 339-350.

About the author


Tim Hatcher has held faculty positions in US universities for two decades. He is currently with
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina. Tim is past Editor of Human Resource
Development Quarterly. His current research interests are ethics, the democratic workplace and
the history of workforce development. Tim Hatcher can be contacted at: tim_hatcher@ncsu.edu

To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: reprints@emeraldinsight.com


Or visit our web site for further details: www.emeraldinsight.com/reprints

You might also like