industrial revolution

industrial revolution. In 1837 Louis-Auguste Blanqui used the phrase to describe the changes Britain had undergone during the previous half-century in its social and economic life. Widespread use of the term followed from Arnold Toynbee's Lectures on the Industrial Revolution of the Eighteenth Century in England published in 1884. Debates about the precise period and its meaning reflected efforts to identify what brought about the transformation from a predominantly rural society, whose major source of livelihoods derived from the land, to a rapidly urbanizing country whose wealth came from commerce and manufacturing.

Symbolic of the industrial revolution was the use of coal as a source of energy. The conversion of coal to coke made cheaper iron ore smelting possible and simultaneously produced town gas, used from the early 19th cent. for lighting. Coal-fuelled boilers provided steam-power for mines drainage, factory machinery, and locomotives, making speed and repetitive activities less arduous and greatly augmenting output. Particularly associated with such changes were cotton textiles, made cheaply in large quantities. Inventions of processes and discoveries of new materials increased the sophistication of products available. Examples of these occurred in metallurgy in the uses of iron and in chemicals. Organizational developments as well as large-scale capital investments gave impetus to the construction of well-built roads run by turnpike trusts and to the making of a nation-wide canal network. The better distribution of raw materials and finished products expanded the domestic economy and made exporting easier.

Social changes occurred simultaneously. Many new jobs were created between the later 18th and the mid-19th cent. from the ever widening applications of technical innovations such as in gas-making, in the chemical industry, in canal and railway transport, and in textiles. In the case of textiles, increased output depended on water- or steam-powered machinery installed in purpose-built factories. Although the total number of jobs in textiles rose, much unemployment was experienced in areas where factory products undercut the prices of the old domestic system of production. New methods of industrial production also required many people to move to urban locations. Some existing towns such as Manchester expanded very rapidly, whilst new towns emerged, such as St Helens (Merseyside). Rapid urban growth posed many unforeseen problems of overcrowded houses, inadequate sanitation, and law and order.

Marx's ideas about the making of capitalist society had their origins in his observation of British industrialization, particularly in Manchester during the 1830s. Marxists went on to argue that the triumph of capitalist organization of production and trade was exemplified most completely in the history of Britain between the accession of George III and the accession of William IV. This process was accomplished by the emergence of the middle class and the creation of an industrial working class from the landless labourers and smaller peasant farmers.

In 1958 W. W. Rostow in his Stages of Economic Growth proposed a model of economic and social change to challenge the Marxist analysis. This ‘non-communist’ manifesto identified five stages in the growth of economies. The crucial third stage was ‘take-off ’ which, in the case of Britain, corresponded to the onset of rapid industrialization in the late 18th cent. and lasted until the early years of Victoria's reign when the economy became ‘mature’. The fourth stage involved having a variety of heavy industries and commercial institutions and imperial ambitions. Rostow claimed for his model predictive capabilities which could be applied world-wide.

Many historians, geographers, and political economists have sought to explain the origins of the changes during the second half of the 18th cent. and why they should have occurred in Britain. The search for one main underlying cause has led to elaborate and careful studies of both economic activities and social developments, including geographical determination, religious discrimination against nonconformists, technological innovations in sources of power, and the rise of literacy.

In contrast other historians have challenged the very concept of an industrial revolution. For example, econometric techniques applied by N. F. R. Crafts and others indicate slow rates of change in British economic life. Innovations in technology and in organization occurred piecemeal in different parts of the economy, suggesting that the image of revolution seems inappropriate. Others have pointed to important economic changes both earlier and later than the period usually identified. For example, E. M. Carus-Wilson identified an industrial revolution in the 13th cent. associated with using water-powered fulling mills in woollen cloth-making. J. U. Nef used the term to describe developments between 1540 and 1640 when the greater use made of coal and metallic ores was accompanied by innovations in agriculture and the growth of overseas trade.

Ian John Ernest Keil

Bibliography

Clarkson, L. A. , Proto-industrialization: The First Phase of Industrialization? (1985);
Crafts, N. F. R. , British Economic Growth during the Industrial Revolution (Oxford, 1985);
Hudson, P. , Britain's Industrial Revolution (1992).