Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
nineteenth century this situation further aggravated due to the continuing urban
growth which now was linked with the socially disrupting effects of early indus-
trialization.
51
Whereas older forms of inter-class solidarity and reciprocal relations
between patrons and clients were eroding, no new institutions or cultural norms had
as yet taken their place. The excessive supply of landless labourers created mass
pauperism as a situation where large parts of the population could not earn their
living despite working hard. This social crisis of pauperism, affecting large parts of
Europe, not just in the cities but most easily visible there, was joined by the acute
pandemias of cholera, haunting Europe from the 1830s in several waves. Reacting
to this crisis, but more speci
cally to the failure of a sweeping reform of the Poor
Law a few years earlier to achieve its goals, Edwin Chadwick, the secretary of the
Poor Law Board, in 1842 published a
'
Report on the Sanitary Conditions of the
Labouring Population of Great Britain
, which was submitted to Parliament and
claimed to document the health conditions of the poorer sections of British society.
With this report Chadwick laid the foundation for the so-called
'
'
Sanitary Move-
ment
, which promoted major infrastructural changes to cities in order to improve
their health situation. Chadwick was a
'
rm believer, as many of his contemporaries,
in the miasma theory of disease causation. Infectious diseases, in his report fre-
quently just termed
'
'
fever
, were caused by bad smells emanating from the ubiq-
uitous dirt and
lth must be removed and
Chadwicks recipe was to bring fresh, clean water in all house-holds, to install
water-closets there and to remove feces and urine from residential quarters by an
underground system of sewers. Cleaning up cities thus would reduce the incidence
of infectious disease, lower mortality rates and enable more poor people to earn
their livelihood by work.
52
This far-reaching and very costly programme was
eventually, with modi
lth in cities. To prevent diseases, this
cations in details, implemented all over Europe and North
America in the second half of the 19th century and helped, together with other
factors such as improved nutrition, to signi
cantly reduce the frequency of epi-
demics, to lower mortality and improve health standards.
53
It is remarkable, that a
reform movement, based on a false scienti
with the discovery of bacteria
as carriers of disease by Pasteur and Koch the miasma theory was effectively
falsi
c theory
—
could muster such wide support and effect such far-reaching changes to
the fabric of cities, but also to the culture of cleanliness and hygiene. Considerations
of hygiene acquired top-priority in the last decades of the 19th century and the
physical transformation of cities, the building of water provision systems, of
sewage systems, the paving and cleansing of streets and squares, the introduction of
regular public waste removal systems, the construction of public slaughter-houses
and public baths were all governed by the goal to improve public hygiene.
54
ed
—
51
Lees and Lees (
2007
).
52
Hamlin (
1998
).
53
Hardy (
2005
).
54
Schott (
2012
).
