Audience Construction in "The Jungle"

Upton Sinclair was a muckraker, which means he worked to bring society's ills into the public eye.  However, that does not quite clarify who Sinclair's audience was meant to be.  One of the most obvious audiences would be government officials and legislators.  Because Sinclair showed the grotesque and horrifying conditions that workers and animals dwelled in, as well as the unsanitary meat-packing procedures, new laws were passed that initiated inspection of factories and regulated the production of food.  This eventually turned into what we know as the FDA.  However, Sinclair's original purpose for "The Jungle" was nots so much to produce change in the food production, but in the labor industry and the living conditions of immigrants.  I believe that Sinclair's audience was the American population as a whole, as well as the government, because he is overall criticizing the animalistic and inhumane social structure that was present at that time.  Towards the end of the book, it  becomes very obvious that Sinclair is a fan of socialism.  Thus, it could be possible that "The Jungle" was not even meant to invoke change, but to make a political statement.

To me, the reason that there is more than one possible intended audience for "The Jungle" is the way that Sinclair writes the book.  Because of his use of anti-sentimentalism and realism,  the book becomes an objective representation of what an immigrant family's life was like at that time.  He does not use any kind of blatant appeals to pathos in order to instruct the reader of his opinions or direct them to agree with his points of view.  Rather, the reader is supposed to take the objective representation and interpret the story as they wish.  Thus, just as the FDA resulted from the book, many other realizations and opinions have arisen from it.