CLASS CONFLICT AND THE WORKING CLASS’S STRUGGLE TO INSIST POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE THROUGH BRITISH HISTORICAL EVENT ‘PETERLOO MASSACRE’ IN PETERLOO 2018

Abstract

This study concerns the class conflict reflected in one of British Historical events known as Peterloo Massacre through Mike Leigh’s historical movie adaptation, Peterloo. This study has three aims. First, to explain the conflict in a depth-analysis. Second, to discuss what actually the working-class people demanded as the main cause that led to that class conflict and lastly, to investigate the actions that the working-class people took as the manifestation of their struggles in response to that class conflict. The writer of this study applies Marxism and socio-historical approaches to answer and elaborate the problem formulations stated above. Qualitative research method was conducted in this study with primary data taken from the movie itself, which includes the scenes and dialogues within the movie and the secondary data including E-books, journals, pdf, and trusted websites. The result of this study shows that: 1) the class conflict existed as the result of the unjust political systems and laws imposed that led to the social, political, economic gaps with the working class as the casualty and also as the result of opposing interests; 2) the working-class people’s response to these gaps was to insist changes on these unjust political systems and laws by demanding for parliamentary reforms; 3) The working-class people did a series of social movements including campaigns, strike, demonstration/protest movement as the manifestation of their struggles.