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Key Terms

anarchism
an ideology advocating that government be abolished
contract labor
a system in which people sign contracts promising to perform work in exchange for a fee
debt bondage
a system in which a person who owes money works (or provides someone else to work) for the creditor until the debt has been repaid
demographic transition
a reduction in family size in the late 1800s caused by falling birth rates in industrialized nations
labor union
an association that organizes workers of all kinds, both skilled and unskilled
naturalism
a literary style that emphasized realistic, detached, impersonal depictions of characters whose actions were molded by their environment in ways they often had no ability to control
penal labor
forced labor assigned as punishment to those convicted of crimes
pogroms
violent attacks on Jewish people in the Russian empire
real wages
wages measured in terms of the amount of goods and services that can be purchased with them
realism
a literary and artistic style that realistically depicted everyday life in the contemporary world
romanticism
an artistic movement formed in response to the Industrial Revolution that prized emotion and imagination and took as its subjects the themes of nature, the ordinary person, the exotic, the ancient, and the supernatural
social democrat
people who favor the creation of a socialist society through democratic means
Taylorism
a system of management that sought to improve workers’ productivity by curbing wasteful movements
trade union
an association that organizes workers in a particular craft or industry
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