History Takes to the Streets
In the backdrop of European wars that ravaged for much of the 19th century, historians had evolved from stenographers for kings and emperors to promoters of thought and intellectual curiosity. However, these authors were still referring to the masses and the elites as two diametrically opposed forces rather than the more realistic portrayal of thousands of small social subsets swirling around common cultural and political goals. Authors like Jacob Burckhardt and Frederich Nietzsche, while writing about masses and cultural history, were not in favor of democratic institutions that allowed unfettered access to power because it was something historically rare. Rather, they were still interested in viewing the levers of power and the powerful but began to take a peek down from the tower to look down upon the people.
Burckhardt, a scholar on the Italian Renaissance and Swiss professor, felt that if an egalitarian society and its values were prevalent in the world, it would be detrimental to the masses. As antithetical as this argument may seem, Burckhardt felt that equality would force the naturally inferior beyond their capabilities and social order would be eliminated. The masses, instead of becoming democratic and at the controls of government, would instead be left without social structure and an authoritarian or despotic government would rise. Burckhardt’s understanding of cultural history is key here, because his writings promoted the use of “high culture” and a sort of metaphysical cultural force outside of society to understand Western society. He did not see the vagaries of short term public opinion and political conflict to be constructive to the masses but a need to embrace the slow roll of history and tradition.
Nietzsche, a favorite among the college philosophy crowd, disagreed with the supremacy of cultural history promoted by Burckhardt. Instead of relying on history and culture, Nietzsche hoped for a cultured, intelligent “Higher Man” to rescue the world from nihilism and only saw the masses as a breeding ground for this “Higher Man.” However, he did not stray to far from his University of Basel colleague (the two held professorships there in the mid-19th century) as regards the total elimination of culture in favor of politics. Both saw the destruction of culture and social order as the beginning of despotism similar to the monarchies of the past, though much more deeply ingrained with the tools of industrialism at their aid.
By the 1870s and 1880s, the historian had become an important observer of how the masses interacted with the powerful elites in European culture. However, John R. Greene’s “Short History of the English People” proves that heading into the 20th century, there was still a disconnect for the educated and the uneducated. Greene’s “Short History,” which was published first in 1872, sketched a period by period image of English culture, favoring religious and social development over the imposition of political ideas against servant classes in the past. Greene’s “people,” however, were the entire English nation rather than the masses. Greene certainly was not alone in his inability to accurately depict the complexities of the lower classes and even today historians, educated in academically isolated environments, have difficulty seeing the entire cultural picture of the “masses.”
