The Waning of ‘Old Corruption’

Abstract Most historians of Britain now take for granted that a narrow and mostly landed élite managed to retain its social supremacy throughout much of the 19th century. But as of yet, there is no thorough explanation for the persistence of the old elite's political authority in an age when that authority was seriously questioned by many Britons. In this study, the book furnishes an important part of this explanation. It argues that the mostly Pittite governing élite helped to allay the suspicions of parasitism at the root of the familiar critique of 'Old Corruption' by responding to intense pressure to sanitize government. They did this by reducing and redistributing the tax burden; by eliminating serious administrative abuses such as the grant of lucrative sinecures and unmerited pensions; and by ostentatiously dedicating themselves to public business rather than the pursuit of wasteful privileges for themselves and their hangers-on. If the frugal, liberal state that partly resulted from these reforms was scarcely capable of ameliorating social injustice, at least it could no longer be seen to contribute to it through favouritism and a heavy and inequitable tax load. Such a state was well suited for the preservation of a narrow ruling elite.