Charles James Booth (30 March 1840 – 23 November 1916) was a British shipowner, Comtean positivist, social researcher, and reformer, best known for his innovative philanthropic studies on working-class life in London towards the end of the 19th century.

[2] Booth's work, followed by that of Seebohm Rowntree, influenced government policy regarding poverty in the early 20th century and helped initiate Old Age pensions and free school meals for the poorest children.

[4] Born at Liverpool, Lancashire, on 30 March 1840 to Charles Booth and Emily Fletcher, his father was a wealthy shipowner and corn merchant as well as being a prominent Unitarian.

[6] He joined his brother, Alfred Booth, in the leather trade in 1862 and together they established a successful shipping line, in which Charles remained actively involved until his retirement in 1912.

[9] After learning the shipping trade, Booth was able to persuade Alfred and his sister Emily to invest in steamships and established a service to Pará, Maranhão, and Ceará in Brazil.

[6] In 1886, influenced earlier by positivism, Booth embarked on his major survey of London life and labour conditions for which he became famous and commonly regarded as initiating the systematic study of poverty in Britain.

His work on the study and his concern with the problems of poverty led to an involvement in campaigning for old-age pensions and promoting the decasualisation of labour.

[8] Booth publicly criticised the claims of Henry Hyndman, the leader of the Social Democratic Federation, Britain's first socialist party.

Booth then hired numerous researchers to assist with the full study of the whole of London, which investigated the three main topics of poverty, occupations, and religion.

This research, which looked at the incidence of pauperism in the East End of London, showed that 35% were living in abject poverty –[citation needed] even higher than the original figure.

The fruit of this research was a second expanded edition of his original work, published as Life and Labour of the People in London in nine volumes between 1892 and 1897.

Booth was far from tempted by the ideals of socialism, but had sympathy with the working classes and, as part of his investigations, he took lodgings with working-class families and recorded his thoughts and findings in his diaries.

[16] From 1886 to 1903, while Charles Booth was conducting his landmark survey on the life and labour of London's poorest inhabitants he created poverty maps to illustrate the conditions of the lives of these people.

[17] Booth's maps were based on observations of differences in lifestyle and focused on qualitative factors: food, clothing, shelter, and relative deprivation.

Many who analyzed the maps noted how there existed greater concentrations of poverty south of the Thames, compared to the East End Slums.

Booth and his team of investigators discovered how the clergymen, women, and working people enjoyed engaging in the strict allocation of charity.

Therefore, towards the end of his survey, Booth makes the proposition to abolish church relief work, and that officials would have the responsibility to assist those who would benefit greatly.

[21] Booth declined subsequent offers from PM William Ewart Gladstone of elevation to the peerage (barony then viscountcy) to sit in the House of Lords.

While some of his investigators, such as Beatrice Webb, became Socialists as a result of their research, Booth was critical of the way in which the Liberal Government appeared to support Trade Unions after winning the 1906 General Election.

[24] Booth purchased William Holman Hunt's painting The Light of The World, which he donated to the Dean and Chapter of St Paul's in 1908.

A memorial dedicated to him stands on Thringstone village green, and a blue plaque has been erected on his house in South Kensington: 6 Grenville Place.

[20] Booth's 1902 study included antisemitic references to the impact of Jewish immigration, comparing it to the "slow rising of a flood" and that "no Gentile could live in the same house with these poor foreign Jews, and even as neighbors they are unpleasant; and, since people of this race, though sometimes quarrelsome amongst themselves, are extremely gregarious and sociable, each small street or group of houses invaded tends to become entirely Jewish".

[39] In 2006, Booth also received criticism for his London Poverty Maps, showing in dark and opaque colours the houses and streets where poor people lived.

While Booth classified people by their source of income, Rowntree made distinctions through class and specifically categorised groups by their economic relationships.