Scabs and traitors: taboo, violence and punishment in labour disputes in Britain, 1760-1871

In its broadest sense, this book is concerned with the attempt by workers in Britain during the period 1760-1871 to engage in collective action in circumstances of conflict with their employers during a time when the nation and many of its traditional economic structures and customary modes of working were undergoing rapid and unsettling change.

More specifically, the book principally focuses on the attempt by those workers favouring a collective approach to struggle to overcome what they felt to be one of the main obstacles to collective action, the uncooperative worker.