Political posts are often held by rich people – this is still true today, but it was even more true then. And alongside holding political posts, rich people often socialised and befriended political people in order to ensure their best interests would be served.

Because “scandals” would affect the public perception of everyone involved, a big scandal – then and today – would cause problems for the focus of the scandal and their associates. For this reason, scandals could break up lucrative relationships and were to be avoided at all costs.

Throughout the play Mr Birling repeatedly reminds the Inspector that he has influential friends. His reminders, though, more often take the form of a threat. Through his character we are reminded of one timeless conflict:

1. That rich, powerful people can threaten law enforcement officers by name-checking high-ranking members of society.

2. That the law, when confidently and powerfully enforced, can threaten even the rich.

Priestly uses Mr Birling to explore this ever present struggle in society.

1. Find examples of Mr Birling worrying about how scandals might damage his chances.

2. Find examples of Mr Birling threatening the Inspector.

3. How does the inspector respond to Mr Birling’s threats?

Because the rich control the money, they often also controlled the means by which poor people could get help through charity. Often, back then – as today – the wives of rich men would keep themselves busy by entering into some kind of charity work. They saw this work as repaying a debt to society and, possibly, as saving their own souls.

Mrs Birling is actively involved in the Brumley Women's Charity Organisation. Such organisations, which relied upon the financial support of rich people, were frequently found in large industrial cities during the Victorian and Edwardian eras. Whether someone got help or not depended on whether the organisers, like Mrs Birling, thought the person deserved to be helped or whether they thought that the person was simply a “no-hoper.”

Essentially, without a welfare state or the NHS poor people who fell on hard times – whether through illness, bad luck or, in the case of Eva Smith, being raped – would have to go to a rich person to plead for their help. The decision of whether they deserved it or not fell entirely on the judgement of the board.

1. Find examples of Mrs Birling showing uncharitable behaviour.

2. Find examples that prove that Eva Smith was capable of looking after herself, if it wasn’t for circumstances beyond her control.

In 1912 women’s role in society was on the cusp of changing, largely because of the rise of the middle classes. The suffragettes’ movement was beginning to take shape and the UK was just six years away from granting the first votes for women. However, in 1912, women’s lives were still very much controlled by their relationship to men.

Middle and upper class women were still judged by their husbands’ successes, and the best an intelligent, hard-working, wealthy woman could hope for was to marry someone richer or of a higher social class. It is interesting to note that in Inspector Calls, Sheila is getting married to Gerald – who is of a higher social class (his parents are gentry) – while Mrs Birling married someone who was rich, but of a lower social class – Mr Birling is nouveau riche, or new rich, meaning he wasn’t part of the aristocracy but was as wealthy as some of the gentry. Some of the negative energy that Mrs Birling displays during the play could be put down to a hidden resentment at this fact.

At the same time, women’s liberation movements were beginning to take shape and freedom was coming. Sexuality was becoming more open and, as a result, looks were very important. The 1910s saw an explosion of beauty products: lotions, perfumes, creams and soaps were becoming big business.

Fashions were also changing rapidly. Exciting innovations from abroad – including the more “liberated” U.S. and France (where Chanel was being launched) – were beginning to change female dress and introduced new body shapes and fabrics. As a result of this, taste and style were becoming increasingly important for young Georgian women. Sheila most clearly displays this as, although she is rich, she is simply not as good looking as Eva. As a result, like a bully, she exerts the only power she has and gets her fired.

Equally, although promiscuity was becoming accepted, high society was still uncomfortable with it. As a result, there were certain bars which men would frequent to meet the kind of women who were open to casual sexual encounters. One such place is Palace Bar.

Three people in the play visit the Palace Bar: Eric, who meets and then rapes Eva there; Gerald, who picks her up and then turns her into his live-in mistress; and Alderman Meggarty, who Gerald rescued Eva from.

The point Priestly is making is that wealthy men from across the age spectrum visited these places, and each of them abused women to satisfy their own sexual desires, regardless of the effect it would have on their victims. One way of looking at it is to say that they forced women into poverty and then, once they were desperate, used them to satisfy their sexual desires, then discarded them when they were done.

1. Find examples of women being undermined by men.

2. Find examples of women being afraid of judgement by men.

3. Find examples of women being abused by men.

4. Find examples of women being protected by men.

5. Find examples of women being stronger than men.

The Great Unrest is the term used by historians to describe the period a 100 years ago when Britain saw a wide range of strikes and other struggles where workers pushed for better pay and conditions.

On August 16th 1911 two young men were shot dead by the British Army on mainland Britain. John ‘Jac’ John, a tinplate worker, had joined a picket line of railway workers who were on strike in protest at average wages of £1 per week, which were about 20% below the average wage paid to skilled manual workers. The other man was a Leonard Worsell, form London, who’d only been passing by at the time.

And what happened in Llanelli was not an isolated incident. In Tonypandy one striker was shot dead and around 500 injured in November 1910. In September the same year miners on strike in South Wales had fought pitched battles against troops, the police and scabs. Seamen in Southampton came out on strike over wages and this spread to other ports with dockers and carters joining in. Even places that were not unionised took up the fight. In Hull some 15,000 dockers threatened to burn the docks down.

The bitter truth was that at this time there was no security of employment. Employers could hire and fire at will: if a customer complained, dismissal was likely at a moment’s notice.

What was really taking place here, though, was a result of higher standards of living across the country and a desire from the working classes to be treated as human beings, not just commodities. In many ways the roots of this desire can be seen as far back as Charles Dickens’ Christmas Carol (1843) which celebrated a socialist agenda and championed support for the working classes.

In 1900 the British Labour Party was founded and was slowly becoming a strong political voice for the working people. The media (newspapers and radio) was also becoming powerful. New tabloid newspapers, such as the Daily Mail, published photographs, and gave ordinary people a greater awareness of their place in society, as well as glimpses of a life with money. People's expectations began to rise and so did their demands. Strikes became more frequent as more people took part in the struggle for better pay and working conditions.

The rise in expectations from the working people spread fear amongst the wealthy elite who saw the workers’ demands for better pay as an infringement on their “right” to make a healthy profit. Often, the state intervened on the side of the management. However, with World War I around the corner, the country’s reliance on the common working man was about to be highlighted in a way that no-one could have expected…

1. Find examples of workers’ rights being abused by those in power.

2. Find examples of Mr Birling talking about his workers and their needs. How does Gerald seem to feel about this?

3. How does the Inspector feel about them? Find some quotes where he talks about Eva’s requests.

4. How do Sheila and Eric feel about workers and their needs?

Although it was becoming less important, Georgian Britain was still a very class based society. There were a number of different classes, the basic picture was this:

Royalty: At the top of the pyramid were the Royals, or anyone with associations to the Royal Family. They were, in effect, the biggest celebrities of the day.

Aristocracy: Next came the aristocracy – or the gentry. They were people born into families who had, in their histories, Lords, Ladies, Barons, Dukes, Earls, or other titles. Often these families would have earned their titles in old battles fought hundreds of years before. Money earned then would have been passed down through generations alongside the hereditary titles.

However, although the gentry were privileged, it was often the case that a history of preferential treatment was leaving many aristocratic families falling on hard times as wayward children drank and gambled family money away. Despite this, because aristocratic titles were still admired by members of society and because they couldn’t be earned, many upper class families dreamt of marrying their children into the families that would give their grand-children a title, and a relationship with the Royals!

Upper class: Alongside introducing new technology, the Industrial Revolution radically altered the distribution of wealth in the UK. Previously, money was mainly handed down through inheritance; in this world it was hard for a family to make any serious money and most people stayed within the class they were born into.

However, with the new technologies of the Industrial Revolution, new families began earning big money. Traders and sailors, who brought in rich fabrics, spices and other luxury goods from across the empire made money from wealthy aristocrats who had cash to burn. Factory owners who had mastered working in the dirt and smoke of machinery earned great money mass-producing the clothes and other goods that kept Britain going.

The upper class – or nouveau riche – owned big businesses had the cash that aristocratic families often lacked; they developed relationships with politicians and began to exert real influence; and they lived well. However, many of them earned their places on the back of the blood, sweat and – in many cases – the deaths of their working class former peers.

Middle Class: The middle classes were skilled and able, and performed professional tasks in the middle. Police inspectors, for example, would fall into this bracket. As would factory managers, who worked for their upper class managers. They had reasonable lives, and although they couldn’t afford the luxury of their superiors they wouldn’t have lived in squalor.

Many people argue that it is, historically, the middle classes who fight most vehemently for the rights of those below them since they have the clearest vision of how it is to live on both sides of the fence.

Working class: The largest class in the UK saw millions working in menial jobs, producing the goods that made those above them rich. Working class families earned their cash at physically exhausting, mentally numbing jobs for hours and hours each day. Their working conditions were miserable, dangerous and long. They were paid enough to keep them going and pay rises were resisted.

Although pay rises were resisted in order that the upper classes could make enough money to allow them push at the door of the aristocracy, low pay had another effect: it put the working classes in a hold and kept them there.

Essentially: if you only pay someone enough to keep them alive and will sack them if they offend you then you are keeping them in a form of slavery.

Slavery was abolished in this country in 1833, however, Priestly would argue that – albeit in a less violent form – it was still alive and well when you were working for Nike, Apple, Sports Direct, Primark, etc… Arthur Birling.

1. Find quotes that support the idea that the marriage between Sheila and Eric was motivated by a desire for the Birlings to change their social class.

2. How does Eva feel about the class she was in? Where does she refer to this directly?

3. Lower class characters feature heavily in this play but only one appears on stage. What is significant about her name?

The gap between the rich and the poor has always existed, and, probably, always will. However, at certain key moments in history certain events have rocked the boat.

The French Revolution took place in 1789, when the French working classes rose up against the aristocracy and – during a period called simply The Terror – when tens of thousands of rich French landowners were beheaded at the guillotine.

And again, in 1919, in Russia the people rose up against the aristocracy and killed thousands before taking power and installing a communist government. Communism is a kind of aggressive, hard line form of socialism where everything – including all property – is owned by the state and everyone, regardless of their job, gets paid the same.

In France, the revolution was successful though it resulted in an Emperor, Napoleon, taking over who was virtually indistinguishable from the former Royal Family. In Russia, the Communist dream was taken over by a vicious dictator (Stalin) who was probably the biggest mass murderer of all time.

However, the fact that neither revolution was successful doesn’t detract from the fact that a very unequal distribution of the wealth always leads to either social unrest or social stagnation. You cannot evolve a people without having them awaken to the fact that they’re being abused.

Mr Birling argues that social instability is nonsense – there’ll be no war; workers’ rights are a flash in the pan; and, he says, that his children are being born into a great time. This is a classic piece of dramatic irony, as the audience knows that society is about to sink into war, just as surely as the Titanic sank to the Arctic depths.

The inspector argues that if men will not learn the lessons of socialism “then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish.” This could be a reference to the war, but also to the kinds of revolution that seem inevitable when the distribution of wealth is so unfair.

1. Find quotes from Arthur Birling that show he doesn’t believe society will have any problems as a result of class conflict.

2. Find quotes from the Inspector that suggest there will be problems.