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Responding to the very harsh conditions in Victorian England, Ruskin underwent a transition from art critic to social reformer. He angered the wealthy mercentile classes by condemning current business practices and economic theory in four essays published in Cornhill Magazine. With pugnacious argument and satire, he accuses John Stuart Mill and other orthodox economists of representing human beings as purely self-interested and amoral, and he redefines key economic concepts from a moral and Christian perspective. Ruskin misrepresents his opponents and errs as an economist, but his ideas have enduring value—despite his ultra-conservative, paternalistic outlook and his rejection of democracy. Ruskin’s demand is that the business elite take it upon themselves to improve the wages of their workers and social conditions in Victorian England. He also wants political economists to take as their goal the well being of the nation. Ruskin is a vivid, conservational, theatrical writer but his writing is difficult for modern readers. Unto This Last is idiosyncratic, but is nevertheless a masterpiece.
In 1860, John Ruskin was an acclaimed art critic. This was to change dramatically with the publication of four essays in Cornhill Magazine. Victorian England was a land of poverty, urban decay, brutal working conditions, and ill health. Meanwhile manufacturers and merchants had become wealthy. Always deeply moral, Ruskin had become appalled and outraged by what he saw around him. Social commentary had already become part of his art criticism.
Ruskin shocked his readers by condemning current business practices and the economic theory underlying these practices. He offered an alternative vision of a better society in which workers are treated fairly, the importance of clean air, water, and soil was recognized, and warfare was rejected. Ruskin had planned seven essays, but the hostile response he received caused Cornhill Magazine to end the series with the fourth. Ruskin lived the rest of his life as an embattled, increasingly bitter social reformer. Gradually his ideas and, especially Unto This Last became very influential.
Ruskin pugnaciously challenges the prevailing economic thinking of his day, declaring it utterly mistaken, immoral, and deeply destructive. Orthodox theory was developed by Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, David Ricardo, and others. They support laissez faire capitalism and represent human beings motivated only by the desire for financial gain. Ruskin never bothers about data or statistics, yet he almost always argues from a stance of absolute certainty. Ruskin redefines key economic terms from a humanistic and Christian perspective. He calls for moral regeneration, social reform, and commitment to the betterment of the nation rather than self-interest.
In challenging orthodox political economy, Ruskin often represents the ideas of John Stuart Mill and others inaccurately. For example, Mill's self-interested “economic man” is a concept; it doesn't represent Mill's own ethical outlook. However, some economist, business owners, and politicians did justify their behavior on the basis of economic man. Even when Ruskin is seriously in error, his ideas show insight and hold enduring relevance and value. For instance, national economies are not inherently a zero-sum game. But even so, the benefits of a productive economy are often distributed unfairly. Ruskin is wrong when he uses artificially small groups of people to demonstrate abuses arising from highly inefficient markets. But abuse from highly inefficient markets does in fact take place. What is most bothersome in Ruskin's thinking is not his economics but rather his rejection of democracy, unionism, and workers’ right to fight for better lives.
Because of his hierarchical, paternalistic political outlook, Ruskin demands that the business elite improve the conditions of the lower classes out of moral responsibility. Though no socialist, he proposes government intervention in regard to education, vocational training, factories managed by the government, and old-age homes. Ruskin wants to see employers agree on rates of pay for each category of worker and to give workers more employment security than day labor. Ruskin was a very early environmentalist who recognized how much human beings lose when they are denied sunlight, fresh air, and open meadows. He also makes clear his great abhorrence of war. Ruskin wants political economists to focus much more on what is produced and the beneficial consumption of goods. The true goal of political economy and of business leaders is to create a nation of healthy, engaged workers who live fulfilled, happy lives.
Ruskin is a brilliant prose stylist with a rare gift for striking and memorable phrasing. His insightful observations on many topics have often been compiled into books and now are prevalent on the Internet. The prose style of Unto This Last mixes argument, satire, and deeply moving statements of his hopes for moral regeneration. It is vivid, conversational, and theatrical.
Ruskin very consciously wrote Unto This Last in a simpler style than his art critism so that it could be more widely read. Even so, Unto This Last is very difficult for modern readers. Deeply steeped in the Christian Bible, Ruskin quotes scripture and uses Biblical phrasing, especially in the third and fourth essays where he often writes as an angry prophet. The individual essays have a complex and perhaps eccentric structure, and the overall structure of the published book was not determined at the outset. Ruskin, however, regarded Unto This Last as his best-written book. Unto This Last is a masterpiece, but a deeply idiosyncratic masterpiece.