Breaking Things at Work: Gavin Mueller on the Luddites and Labor Resistance pt 1 of 3
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Deezer They've been remembered as machine-smashers who tried to stop the future with a hammer — but historian Eric Hobsbawm called what they were doing “collective bargaining by riot.” In this episode, Prof. Gavin Mueller (University of Amsterdam), author of Breaking Things at Work, walks through who the Luddites actually were: skilled textile workers in England's Midlands, organized under the mythical banner of King Ludd, fighting to preserve their wages, their working conditions, and the quality of their craft against machines introduced without negotiation. Mueller makes the case that this was a rational response to an existential threat, not an irrational rejection of progress — a reading that places the Luddites' resistance inside the history of the idea of progress rather than outside it.
This episode is the first of a three-part conversation with Mueller drawn from a single recorded interview. Episode 18 turns to Marx and the theorists who followed him; Episode 19 carries the argument through to Shoshana Zuboff and today's debates about artificial intelligence.
About Our GuestGavin Mueller is an Assistant Professor of New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam, where he also teaches Marxist Theory for the Critical Studies MA at the Sandberg Instituut. He holds a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies from George Mason University. He is a Contributing Editor at Jacobin and a member of the editorial collective of Viewpoint Magazine. He is the author of Breaking Things at Work: The Luddites Are Right About Why You Hate Your Job (Verso, 2021), the book at the center of this episode, and Media Piracy in the Cultural Economy (Routledge, 2019).
Show Notes & Timestamps- Introduction — 0:13
- Guest Introduction: Gavin Mueller — 1:13
- About the Book: Breaking Things at Work — 1:50
- Why the Luddites? — 8:44
- The Luddite Movement — 11:36
- Guilds vs. Unions — 21:36
- Hobsbawm & Rehabilitating the Luddites — 25:49
- Outro & What's Next — 32:27
Key Concepts & TermsLudditeEarly-1800s English textile workers who organized to resist machines introduced into their trade without negotiation, named for the mythical figure Ned Ludd. The word is now often used as an insult for anyone who resists technology — a meaning that differs from the historical movement's actual grievances.
GuildA trade association of skilled workers that set standards for wages, training, and the quality of goods produced. Guilds structured England's textile trade before industrialization reorganized it around factory-owned machinery.
Combination ActsLaws passed by the British Parliament in 1799 and 1800 that made it illegal for workers to organize collectively to negotiate wages or conditions, closing off legal routes to the kind of bargaining unions would later provide.
Gig MillA mechanized cloth-finishing machine, along with the stocking frame, at the center of the Luddite disputes. These machines could produce goods faster and with less-skilled labor, undercutting the wages and standards guild-trained workers had maintained.
Fascinating Historical InsightsCollective Bargaining by RiotHistorian Eric Hobsbawm's phrase, discussed in this episode, reframed Luddite machine-breaking as a form of negotiation rather than mindless destruction — a strategy workers turned to precisely because the Combination Acts had closed off legal organizing.
A Mythical LeaderThe Luddites organized under the banner of a fictional figure, “King Ludd” or “Ned Ludd.” Letters and proclamations were issued in his name rather than any real leader's — a structure that let the movement act without a leader who could be arrested and used to dismantle it.
Guilds vs. UnionsGuilds regulated an entire trade's standards and training; unions, illegal until decades later, organized workers within a single employer relationship to bargain collectively. The two represent different structures of worker power, not simply an older and newer version of the same thing.
Not Anti-ProgressThe Luddites' documented demands centered on wages, working conditions, and product quality. Their resistance sits inside a debate about who progress serves, not outside the idea of progress altogether.
Resources & Further ReadingPrimary SourcesGavin Mueller, Breaking Things at Work: The Luddites Are Right About Why You Hate Your Job (Verso, 2021) — the book at the center of this episode.
Works DiscussedE.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (New York: Vintage, 1966).
Eric J. Hobsbawm, “The Machine Breakers,” Past and Present 1 (February 1952).
Kevin Binfield, Writings of the Luddites (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015).
Peter Linebaugh, Ned Ludd and Queen Mab: Machine-Breaking, Romanticism, and the Several Commons of 1811–12 (Oakland: PM Press, 2012).
Coming Up NextIn Episode 18, “Theorizing the Machine,” the conversation with Gavin Mueller continues from Marx through the cyberneticists who followed him.
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Email: marshall@notionsofprogress.com
About the ShowNotions of Progress traces ideas of progress from antiquity to the age of AI. Each episode examines how thinkers across history have conceived of human advancement — and what those conceptions reveal about the assumptions of their time and ours. Hosted by Marshall, the show operates as a scholarly curation: surfacing the debates and the scholarship rather than prescribing which position is correct.
Marshall holds an MA in History from Cambridge University, where his thesis examined Georges Sorel's epistemology of myth and the role of ideas in animating collective action, and an MSc from Oxford University's Saïd Business School, specializing in Complexity Science and Leadership.
Host: Marshall | Contact: marshall@notionsofprogress.com | Website: notionsofprogress.com
Full transcript available at: https://youtu.be/FrsMuLriAWA]