A Fierce Discontent

McGerr begins Part 2 by exploring how the new progressive middle class sought to change other American classes through their new creed of association. Progressives felt that they needed to reshape others’ values pertaining to the role of the individual in relation to society, domestic life and gender roles, and the roles of work and pleasure in American life.

The big question for progressives was how to best approach reshaping other people in the image of middle class values. Whereas the upper class’s doctrine of individualism blamed the individual for their “crimes,” new sociological research on the role of environment revealed that reformers could “reshape character by reshaping the environment” (232). The middle class came to understand that many of the issues experienced and perpetuated by both the working and upper classes were the product of the environments in which they lived, worked, and played. If the middle class achieved success in creating society in their own image, they would need to reform the other classes by meeting their specific needs and, in the process, eradicating their vices.

Equipped with this new understanding of the role of environment in shaping behaviors, with a fervent urgency, the middle class set out to change the negative aspects of people’s environments.