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ABSTRACT
A leading figure of the British and Indian intellectual stage from the 1880s, Annie Besant (1847–1933) is chiefly remembered for her numerous and somewhat diverging commitments. This article seeks to account for her shift from socialism to theosophy by focusing on the latter as a system of thought and on the philosophical basis of her critique of capitalism. It is argued that the case for the common ownership of means of production that she makes throughout her socialist writings both results from her secularism and explains her eventual drift away from it. In an attempt to promote equality through democratic and pragmatic methods, Besant claimed to predicate her enterprise on the laws of evolution rather than on utopian schemes or revolutionary action. It is shown how this approach drew on philosophies of history: collectivism was deemed the necessary outcome of economic changes and the next stage of industrialization. It is also shown how Besant’s brand of socialism rested on a faith in progress, rather than on scientific reasoning. A secularized theology – her plea for socialism, it appears – was at odds with the philosophical foundations of democracy that she advocated throughout her life.
Notes on contributor
Stéphane Guy is senior lecturer at the University of Cergy-Pontoise (France). He wrote his PhD on Bernard Shaw’s political thought and has published articles on British socialist intellectuals, notably the late-nineteenth century Fabians. He co-edited the volume The Victorian Legacy in Political Thought (Peter Lang, 2014) and an issue of the Revue Française de Civilisation Britannique in September 2016: “Economic Crisis in the UK Today: Causes and Consequences”.
Notes
1 Wolfe, From Radicalism to Socialism, 238.
2 Nethercot, First Five Lives of Besant, 294.
3 Ibid., 323.
4 Taylor, Besant, 242.
5 Ibid., 223.
6 Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 12.
7 Ibid., 60.
8 Ibid., 66.
9 Bevir, “Besant’s Quest for Truth”, 92. On the Fabian brand of socialism, see also Bevir, The Making of British Socialism.
10 Pécastaing-Boissière, Besant, 145.
11 Ibid., 170.
12 Terrier, “Besant”, 2.
13 Ibid., 46.
14 Besant, Autobiography, 338.
15 Yeo, “A New Life”, 18.
16 Whilst Besant did instil into the Theosophical Society a concern for social progress and eventually created the Theosophical Order of Service in 1908, she did not remain the active member of the Fabian Society or of the socialist movement that she had been before her conversion.
17 Viswanathan, Outside the Fold, 185.
18 Ibid.
19 Ibid., 192
20 Dixon, Divine Feminine, 9–10.
21 Miller, Slow Print, 238.
22 MacKay, Creative Negativity, 100.
23 Ibid., 106.
24 On theosophy as an immanentist religion, see Bevir, “The West Turns Eastward”; Dixon, Divine Feminine.
25 Besant, Autobiographical Sketches, 130; Besant, Autobiography, 111.
26 Besant, “Why I Am a Socialist”, 6.
27 Throughout her socialist writings, Besant advocates the division of property between the State and local bodies, inspired from the French “Commune” of 1871.
28 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 190.
29 Besant, “Why I Am a Socialist”, 2.
30 Dawson, Darwin, Literature and Victorian Respectability, 153; Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 57.
31 Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 33.
32 See Besant, Comte. Positivism was popularized in England by Harriet Martineau and John Stuart Mill, and attracted disciples through the teachings of Richard Congreve and Frederic Harrison. On the influence of positivism on Annie Besant’s thought, see Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 127–29; Wernick, Anthem Companion to Comte, 190–95. On the reception of Auguste Comte in Victorian Britain, see Kent, Brains and Numbers; Wright, Religion of Humanity.
33 Wessinger claims that Besant rejected positivism because it was “too stiff and rigid”; see Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 137.
34 On Auguste Comte’s stadial conception of history and its implications, see De Lubac, Drama of Atheist Humanism; Voegelin, New Science of Politics; Schmaus, “Comte’s Three-States Law”; Vernon, “Comte”; Bourdeau, Les trois états.
35 Comte, System of Positive Polity, 282.
36 Pease, History of the Fabian Society, 10.
37 Ibid., 56–57. On the Fabians and historic necessity, see also McBriar, Fabian Socialism, 70–71.
38 Besant, “Socialist Movement”, 20.
39 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 23.
40 Besant, “Modern Socialism”, 18–19.
41 A successful manufacturer, Joseph Chamberlain, became the mayor of Birmingham in 1873 and implemented a number of radical policies. He called on the Liberal Party to implement the social reforms contained in the “unauthorized programme” of 1885 before breaking with the Liberal Party leadership over Home Rule in 1886 and embracing the Liberal Unionist agenda. The Fabians were keen to interpret Chamberlain’s municipal reforms as a sign of the times and an instance of the unconscious yet inevitable progress of socialism.
42 On the interaction between idealism and socialism, see for instance Carter, Green and the Development of Ethical Socialism. For a discussion of the broader impact of Oxford idealism and Hegel’s legacy on late nineteenth-century Britain, see for instance the introduction to Smith and Helfand, Wilde’s Oxford Notebooks, 17–22.
43 Viswanathan, Outside the Fold, 189.
44 Hegel, Philosophy of Right, 178.
45 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 11.
46 Besant, “Why I Am a Socialist”, 6.
47 Ibid.
48 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 185–86. Two Limited Liability Acts passed in 1852 and 1862 contributed to the growth of what appeared to be an “impersonal” brand of capitalism, 184–204.
49 Ibid., 186.
50 Besant nonetheless briefly discusses Marx’s theory of value in Besant, “Modern Socialism”, 13–14.
51 Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party, 69.
52 Ibid., 76.
53 Besant, “Address to New Members”, 29.
54 Besant, Autobiography, 338.
55 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 7–8.
56 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 203.
57 Ibid.
58 De Lubac, Drama of Atheist Humanism, 188.
59 Ibid., 189.
60 Besant, Autobiography, 338.
61 Wessinger, Besant and Progressive Messianism, 143; Bevir, “Besant’s Quest for Truth”, 83.
62 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 9.
63 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 195.
64 Popper, Poverty of Historicism, 107–8. On the use of history in the nineteenth century, see the analysis of the “comparative historicism” that informed both fiction and evolutionist science narratives in Griffiths, Age of Analogy.
65 Miller, Slow Print, 226.
66 Ibid., 241.
67 See Magee, Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition.
68 Löwith, Meaning in History, 55.
69 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 22.
70 Besant, “White Slavery in London”, 51.
71 Löwith, Meaning in History, 41.
72 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 194.
73 Hobsbawm, “The Fabians Reconsidered”, 262.
74 Berlin, Political Ideas, 67.
75 Besant, “Why I Am a Socialist”, 4.
76 Kavyabisharad, Besant in India, 252. As Nancy Fix Anderson also remarks, “the high expectations of the reformers were quickly crushed. They were frustrated that Besant refused to address the issues of child marriage, the prohibition of widow remarriage and other traditional Hindu social problems”; see ibid., 238.
77 Viswanathan, Outside the Fold, 195.
78 Ibid., 202.
79 Miller, Slow Print, 242–43.
80 Dixon, Divine Feminine, 8.
81 Britain, Fabianism and Culture, 227.
82 Bevir, “Besant’s Quest for Truth”, 91.
83 Pease, History of the Fabian Society, 42.
84 Letwin, Pursuit of Certainty, 378.
85 Besant, “Why I Am a Socialist”, 6.
86 Besant, “Industry under Socialism”, 187.
87 Ibid., 185.
88 Besant, “Evolution of Society”, 14.
89 Hobsbawm, Industry and Empire, 63–67.
90 Orwell, Road to Wigan Pier, 166.
91 Aron, Opium of the Intellectuals, 20.