An Inquiry Into The Workhouse Reform Of Britain In 1930s

Workhouse emerged in the beginning of seventeenth century as an alternative form of relief, providing accommodation to the poor who could not make a living. With the popularity of outdoor-relief, the workhouse relief was the complementary and unpopular term of relief before nineteenth century, and had shown no important influence upon poor relief. However, it helped lots of paupers survive the most difficult days, and earned the nickname of'Pauper Palaces'. But this good reputation of workhouse was ruined in 1930s by the reform of workhouse. The workhouse became the'Bastille' for paupers. The cruel of workhouse after reform had been revealed by many writers, but the reform itself had not been concerned. Aiming at fill the blank of this field, the thesis analyses the causes of it and the condition of the beginning of it through the aspects of system and implement.This thesis consists of four parts:the workhouse reform under the New Poor Law, the background of the reform, the implement of the reform, and the evaluation of the reform. Firstly, it explores the causes and purposes of the reform from analyzing the defect of the old poor law system and the background of the reform. Then, it analyzes the situation of enforcing, by analyzing of the course and problems, and reveals the causes of the failure of the reform. At last, it evaluates the reform, and concludes its influence.The workhouse reform is a great transition in the history of English reliefs, it replaced outdoor-relief with indoor-relief. Workhouse, had taken the function of hospital, school, infirmary, penitentiary, prison, shelter, factory, exactly impaired its duty to provide home to the infirm poor. These mistakes lead to the trouble of reform, and the failure of the reform. The purposes of the reform had not achieved, but, the trial on workhouse-centered poor relief developed the institutes of relief, and provided the most precious experiences for the origination of the Welfare State model of social security of Britain. And the research of workhouse reform can also provide a practical experience to improve and perfect the social security system of China.