The neat things that were going on weren't political for awhile after Napoleon. This is about England from 1815-1848. The war years against Napoleon were years of big rises in industry. England supplied the uniforms, guns, etc. to all the countries who fought Napoleon. At one time, Napoleon even bought uniforms from England, too. After the war, men needed jobs since the war industry had closed down. The lower class was rebelling against the bad conditions. The "Peterloo Massacre" in August of 1819 left 16 people dead–they were rebelling against the Corn Laws in St. Peter's Field in Manchester.
There was a movement for reform. Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) proposed the philosophy of Utilitarianism: do what is useful. What is useful is something which produces the greatest good for the greatest number. It's ok to pursue self interests if you help others by doing enlightened self interest. When you help someone else, you help yourself.
Robert Peel (1788-1850) was in charge of the criminal justice system. The punishment that was normal for the day was death for over 200 crimes. The police used paid informers and weren't trusted. Peel reduced the penalties for crimes. He gave the police training and fired the spies. He convinced people that the po9lice were useful and people started supporting and assisting the police. English police are called "bobbies" after Robert Peel. (Robert=Bob, get it??)
The population had shifted cuz of industry. People went from the coast (trading towns) to middle new towns like Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield (industrial towns). But Parliament hadn't redistricted the country yet. There were towns called Rotten Boroughs–they sent representatives to Parliament, but these boroughs didn't really have any population to speak of. The Reform Bill of 1832 redistricted England to account for the population shift. The government was controlled by the middle class and they did stuff for the middle class.
Malthus (1766-1834) was a clergyman and an economic philosopher. He said the food supply of the world increases arithmetically (1+1+1+1 . . . ) while the population of the world increases geometrically (2X2X2X2 . . . ). Before long, there would be too many people to feed. People will begin to starve. So death would be the solution to overpopulation. Malthus predicted a great starvation would be coming soon. He was wrong then cuz he didn't include the U.S.A. and Canada and Australia as growing lands. The Industrial Revolution made more food, too. In 1776, there were 1 billion people on the earth. In 1976, there were 4 billion people on the earth. Stockmyer predicts that the Malthus solution of death will come on us with things like the swine influenza in India, etc.
Back to England: Workers were unhappy with the rotten conditions. There was a union movement to organize and strike. It didn't work cuz factory owners got Parliament to break the strike. There was a Chartist movement: people signed petitions asking for basic changes in government. People wanted an annual Parliament, more equal representation in the districts, no property qualifications to be elected to Parliament, secret ballots, pay for Parliament members, universal male suffrage, etc. The reforms might have happened except for the universal male suffrage, which held it back (would you want the common crud to vote?).
There was a new economics philosophy. Adam Smith's ideas were becoming popular. He'd been dead for a while (he lived from 1723 to 1790). His idea was called Laissez Faire (French for "Leave Alone"). It was pure capitalism. If there were infinite sellers and infinite buyers, the government should stay out of it. People would buy the best goods at the cheapest prices; therefore, the sellers would try to make the best and cheapest goods. If the government would stay out of it, it would look like an "Invisible Hand" was regulating everything. This idea sounds nice on paper, but it won't work. There is never an infinite number of buyers and sellers. The end result of laissez faire is monopoly!
About the 1840's, the government started regulating business. There were child labor laws to get women and kids out of the mines. Religions opposed laws cuz God had obviously made things as they were supposed to be. A new religion was started by a man named John Wesley (1703-1791). His followers were called Methodists (they did everything according to schedules and methods). He worked with the workers to save their souls. He opposed child education.
This is also the time period of Romantic Literature (not like Harlequin novels!). It is called the Romantic time period because there was such romance surrounding the figures writing during that time. Writers talk about feelings of the future, nature, and changes for the better. The wrote of revolutionary ideals. This is the time period (about 1798-1830's) of poets like William Wordsworth (1770-1850), Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834), Robert Southey (1774-1843), William Blake (1757-1827), John Keats (1795-1821), Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), and George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824). Lord Byron, who led the most controversial and "romantic" life of the Romantic poets, died while fighting for Greek Independence.