America Labour In The Social Transformation, 1869-1929

From 1869 to 1929, The United States experienced a social transformation, which was presented in these aspects: the wave of immigration in the years after the end of civil war; the application of science and technology brought by the second industrial revolution and the development of industrialization and urbanization which was driven by the former two forces. These there aspects dynamically constituted the broad background of the life of American labor in this period.During this period the American labour were obviously different from the manual workers before the civil war. They had few choice facing great social change and race, gender, profession and immigration status granted the labour unique attributes. This attribute did not completely constrain workers to choose how to live, though the choice was limited. Facing the different individuals or groups, the labor's attitude appeared positive and negative, also active and passive. And some traditional properties were diluted with the baptism of social changes gradually, while new properties came into being successively.This paper bases on the files of American labour in the United States Library of Congress and letters of immigrants during this period, starts with the social change, probes the life of the labour, and refers to the study of senior scholars. The paper is to explore the transformation of the labour as a special group of workers in the social changes. At the same time, this paper is to find out the direction of the workers by discussing the relations between culture, government and the labour.The paper consists of four parts in addition to the preamble and the conclusion:Preamble: This part reviews of the status quo of academic research both here and abroad and explains the choice of time and the concept of labour. Part I: This part explains some aspects of social change, which were not only the driving force for social change, but also the appearance. These changes became the "scenes" for the labour. They included: immigration wave; the use of science and technology; industrialization and urbanization. The focus is about effects of the application of science and technology in many areas on the labour.Part II: The constituents of the labour and their social relations. Analyses are focused on different kinds of workers in social changes and three main relations among the labour.Part III: This part analyses the cultural change of the labour in the social transformation. This aspect of change constituted a part of social change.Part IV: This part focus on the relationship among the labour, employers and the governments in social change.