Robber Barons, Captains of the Industry, and the Binaries of Civil Society

This image portrays a political cartoon of Andrew Carnegie; on the one hand, he is sternly telling a worker that his wage is being reduced, and on the other, he is donating money and a library to some people. This image encapsulates an ongoing debate about the great industrialists of the 19th century: Were they ‘robber barons’? Or were they ‘captains of the industry’?

While the reasoning is different, both sides are trying to fit Carnegie into either side of a binary. Sociologist Jeffrey Alexander theorizes that “[binary] codes supply the structured categories of pure and impure into which every member, or potential member, of civil society is made to fit” (Alexander 2006:54). Clearly, either side of the argument wants to place Carnegie into the opposed categories of ‘altruistic’ and ‘greedy’, both binaries of relationships in America (Alexander 2006:58). However, like Alexander theorizes, these positive and negative binaries are “accepted by all sides” (Alexander 2006:64). Both sides agree that greed is bad and that altruism is good; what is disputed then is how these binaries “will be applied to particular actors or groups” (Alexander 2006:64). It is clear that on the one hand, people believe that Carnegie was altruistic because he was philanthropic, and generated jobs and industry for America. But the other side sees the same situation and claims that he was greedy because he didn’t pay his workers well enough and subjected them to bad working conditions.

What is striking in particular about this cartoon is that the binary is being portrayed. Alexander says that although these binaries are idealized, “[social] reality is far from ideal” (Alexander 2006:194). And yet, the debate implies in its dichotomous phrasing (‘robber’ vs ‘captain’) that they were one or another. But the cartoon shows that, in fact, Andrew Carnegie was in some sense both of these things, despite our attempts to argue that he was one or the other.

Works Cited

Alexander, Jeffrey. 2006. The Civil Sphere. New York: Oxford University Press.

Demarest, David. 1892. Forty-Millionaire Carnegie in His Great Double Role.