The most repulsive thing here is the bourgeois
'respectability' bred into the bones of the
workers. The social division of society into
innumerable gradations, each recognised without
question, each with its own pride but also its
inborn respect for its 'betters' and 'superiors',
is so old and firmly established that the
bourgeois still find it pretty easy to get
their bait accepted .
Throughout his acquaintance with Britain Engels was
worried by the growth of respectability in the working
classes. His concern provided the starting point of the
debate over the meaning and significance of respectability
in working-class life and politics. From such perceptions
Marxist thinkers developed the theory of the Labour
Aristocracy - a theory which still underwrites much Marxist
and non-Marxist historical, inquiry. The values encapsulated
in the notion of respectability were equated with the
values of bourgeois capitalism. Roughly, the theory
maintained that the leadership of the working class - the
skilled worker and trade union ~lite - capitulated to
bourgeois values and developed false consciousness. This
false consciousness largely explained the failure of the
British working class to reach Marxist revolutionary class
consciousness
