Worker-on-Worker Violence in the Early Industrial Period.

In this article I will examine workplace violence in the 19th century and its causes through the stories of seven workers. In the mid-19th century, seven millworkers in western Finland died from worker-on-worker violence. These cases form a body of data that I use to analyze the reasons for young men's violent behavior and its connection to the modernization process. The arrival of modern industry shaped new kinds of male roles, with industrial workers being categorized as either skilled or unskilled. The mills were locales in which males were pushed to represent this new kind of industrial masculinity, roles for which few of them were suited. This could lead to their humiliation and emasculation, which, in turn, sometimes resulted in outbursts of violent behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]