Provides an account of the political, social and economic changes that took place in the first half of the 19th century in Britain. This book examines the ways in which the structure of the state was adjusted and moulded to the requirements of the new capitalist order. Saville outlines the changing economics of the time and examines key themes, such as the disciplining of labour (central to the consolidation of state), the permeation of the middle classes into political life and the maintenance of political power by the landed aristocracy, which provided the conditions for the making of money by the new rising middle classes.