World History (Industrial Revolution and Implications) by Shivlal Gupta

Model Answer

Question #1. “The Industrial revolution was due to multi-causal factors combined over centuries”. In light of the above statement explain how Britain was endowed by all factors that were needed for the industrialisation process.

Approach:

•   Briefly define the term industrial revolution.
•   Enumerate various factors that created a conducive environment for the industrial revolution in Britain.
•   Conclude with the gist of your answer

Hints:

Industrial Revolution refers to the adoption of a system of producing commodities on a large scale in huge factories. It marked the final phase of the broad transformation from feudalism to capitalism which had begun with the European Renaissance and the protestant reformation in early modern Europe. It replaced the old system of making goods in the cottages or workshops by the artisans.

Industrial revolution was characterised by the use of iron and steel, the use of new sources of energy or fuels such as coal, steam, and iron, the invention of new machines that increased production, a new method of organisation of work known as the factory system, which involved increased division of labour and specialisation of skill, and developments in transport and communication .All these made possible the mass production of manufactured goods.

Britain the first country to enable the industrialisation process due to following reasons:

• Political Stability and Unified Market:
  • Britain had been politically stable since the seventeenth century, with England, Wales and Scotland unified under a monarchy. The kingdom had common laws, taxation and a single currency. This enabled Britain to have a market that was not fragmented by local authorities levying local taxes on goods that passed through their area, thus increasing their price.
  • Money was widely used as the medium of exchange. A large section of the people received their income in the form of wages and salaries rather than in goods. This gave people a wider choice for ways to spend their earnings and expanded the market for the sale of goods.
  • By the end of 17th century, Britain had a parliamentary government which was favourable to commercial and industrial classes. It pursued policies which enabled the growth of trade and industry in England. Moreover, the Britain political climate was more liberal than continent Europe.
• Agricultural Revolution: Between 1600 and 1800 England had gone through a process called the ‘agricultural revolution’. This was the process by which bigger landlords took over small farms of peasants and enclosed village common lands. They used new methods of cultivation and animal rearing to produce for market. In this manner they created very large estates and increased food production. This forced landless farmers, and those who had lived by grazing animals on the common lands, to search for jobs elsewhere. Most of them went to nearby towns and became the workforce for various factories from the mid eighteenth century.
• Towns, Trade and Finance:
  • From the eighteenth century, many towns in Europe were growing in area and in population. The population of at least 11 British towns doubled between 1750 and 1800. The largest of them was London, which served as the hub of the country’s markets. London had also acquired a global significance. It had become the centre of international trade between Europe, Africa, America and India.
  • In England the movement of goods between markets was helped by a good network of rivers, and an indented coastline with sheltered bays. Until the spread of railways, transport by waterways was cheaper and faster than by land. Most of Britain’s rivers were navigable, cargo on river vessels was easily transferred to coastal ships.
  • The centre of the country’s financial system was the Bank of England (founded in 1694). By 1784, there were more than a hundred provincial banks in England, and during the next 10 years their numbers trebled. By the 1820s, there were more than 600 banks in the provinces, and over 100 banks in London alone. The financial requirements to establish and maintain big industrial enterprises were met by these banks.
• Colonies: By the middle of 18th century, Britain had extensive colonies in North America and was beginning to establish control over large parts of India. The colonies provided Britain with a large market for its industrial produce and also supplied it with raw materials like cotton and also food grains. Colonial conquest and trade provided British merchants and banks with a large amount of capital, which could be invested in industries.
• Rise in population: The markets at home were also expanding as the population grew. In England, population rose from four million in 1600 to six million in 1700 and nine million by the end of the eighteenth century.
• Geography:   The geographical location of England, slightly away from the mainland and relatively safe from foreign invasions, was another cause for industrial revolution The availability of coal and iron deposits in large quantities in England was another contributory factor. By 1800, Britain was producing ten million tons of coal, or 90% of the world’s output.
• Finally the temperate climate of the British Isles was favourable for the manufacturing of cotton cloth.
• Scientific inventions in England in the 18th century also paved the way for the industrial revolution .The increasing demand for manufactured goods encouraged technological innovations.
  • In 1738, John Kay invented the flying shuttle, which changed the weaving system and quickened the pace of production.
  • Spinning jenny invented  by James Hargreaves 1764
  • In 1769 Richard Arkwright invented water-frame and Samuel Crompton invented the spinning mule in 1779
  • In 1765 steam power invented by James watt. In 1781 it was used to run machines.

Conclusion:

Britain accumulated such multi-dimensional resources with itself that the Industrial revolution was inevitable. It had the concentration of wealth in the hands of those who wanted to invest money in production and earn profits due to the agricultural revolution and colonial conquest and trade. Investible capital was provided by the growth of banking institutions in Britain. It had availability of workers who are willing to work for low wages as ‘agricultural revolution’ forced a large part of the rural population to go to the towns in search of work. It had a large market to sell its products. It was provided first by the political unification of Britain and later by the colonies.

Question #2. The Industrial Revolution brought about great changes in the social and economic life of Europe. Explain.

Approach

• Briefly introduce with industrial revolution 
• Trace how the Industrial Revolution brought about great changes in the social and economic life of Europe introduction in both positive and negative ways (Summary of key demand of the question, along with necessary facts). 
• Conclusion by summing up the gist of the answer. 

Hint:

The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, in the period from about 1760 to sometime between 1820 and 1840.This transition included going from hand production methods to machines, new chemical manufacturing and iron production processes, the increasing use of steam power and water power, the development of machine tools and the rise of the mechanized factory system.

The Industrial Revolution brought about great changes in the social life of Europe:

Advantages

• The Industrial Revolution created an increase in employment opportunities. Wages at factories were higher than what individuals were making as farmers. As factories became widespread, additional managers and employees were required to operate them, increasing the supply of jobs and overall wages.
• Since most of the factories and large companies were located near the cities, populations migrated to urban areas searching for jobs, often overwhelming the available housing supply. This led to significant improvements in city planning.
• The Industrial Revolution changed how people worked, the technologies available to them, and often where they lived. It made life comfortable for many though living conditions for workers remained abhorrent, which eventually fuelled the rise of labor unions that led to improved working conditions and fair wages.
• Although there were numerous advancements during the Industrial Revolution, rapid progress caused many issues. As workers left their farms to work in factories for higher wages, it led to a shortage of food being produced.

Disadvantages

• The sharp increase in the number of factories led to an increase in urban pollution. Pollution wasn't contained only in the factories; as people flocked to the cities, the living conditions became deplorable as the urban resources were overwhelmed.
• Sewage flowed in the streets in some cities while manufacturers dumped waste from factories into rivers. Water supplies were not tested and protected as they are today. As a result, regulations, and laws were enacted to protect the population.
• The Industrial Revolution provided an incentive to increase profits, and as a result, working conditions in factories deteriorated. Long hours, inadequate remuneration, and minimal breaks became the norm. Child labor was a significant issue. Health issues arose for many of the factory workers giving rise to the labor movement throughout the U.S.

The Industrial Revolution brought about great changes in the economic life of Europe

• In particular, average income and population began to exhibit unprecedented sustained growth. Some economists have said the most important effect of the Industrial Revolution was that the standard of living for the general population in the western world began to increase consistently for the first time in history, although others have said that it did not begin to meaningfully improve until the late 19th and 20th centuries.
• GDP per capita was broadly stable before the Industrial Revolution and the emergence of the modern capitalist economy, while the Industrial Revolution began an era of per-capita economic growth in capitalist economies.
• An economic recession occurred from the late 1830s to the early 1840s when the adoption of the Industrial Revolution's early innovations, such as mechanized spinning and weaving, slowed and their markets matured.
• Innovations developed late in the period, such as the increasing adoption of locomotives, steamboats and steamships and hot blast iron smelting. New technologies, such as the electrical telegraph, widely introduced in the 1840s and 1850s, were not powerful enough to drive high rates of growth. 

Conclusion:

Rapid economic growth began to occur after 1870, springing from a new group of innovations in what has been called the Second Industrial Revolution. These innovations included new steel making processes, mass-production, assembly lines, electrical grid systems, the large-scale manufacture of machine tools, and the use of increasingly advanced machinery in steam-powered factories.