The Industrial Revolution

I. Means of Production

A. Technology--the development of new technologies altered they way workers did their jobs, as Adam Smith had described the pin factory in Wealth of Nations.


1. Steam engine--this invention might be the best choice to epitomize the first Industrial Revolution, because it powered many of the other innovations. The “invention” of the steam engine has been credited to James Watt; in actuality, his machine was an incremental improvement on already existing steam engines. Steam engines began to be applied in a number of industries.


2. Coal mining--took on new importance with the refinement of the steam engine, because coal was the fuel of the new means of power. The earliest steam engines were used to pump water out of the ever-deepening coal mines. Within a relatively short time, steam engines were placed on vehicles called locomotives (which quickly became used for the distribution of coal); there also developed an increased production of steel, which was in part spurred by the expansion of railroads (rails, locomotives, rolling stock), and the fact that in England the need to find an alternative to charcoal (made from trees).

3. Steel manufacturing--made possible because much of England was denuded of trees by the turn of the 19th century--and peat (or “turf,” the source of heat for most of the rural poor) would not provide enough heat to make iron. Adding coal--and later, coke, a refined form of coal--not only transformed the iron into steel, but made the steel stronger and more flexible than was previously possible.



4. Textiles--steam engines quickly replaced water wheels to power machinery in the textile industry. At this early stage, the machinery in question was used to produce the yarn used to produce cloth--manufacturing cloth itself was at this early period was still left to handloomers in the countryside (although by the 1840s most of these workers would be replaced by the power loom.


B. The Transportation Revolution--contributed to the Industrial Revolution by facilitating access to raw materials, distributing manufactured goods, and providing the means to recruit workers.


1. Canals--not a new means of transportation, of course, but their development facilitated the distribution of goods and raw materials within in country. The disadvantage of canals in Northern Europe and North America was that they were out of operation for 3-5 months a year because of winter.



2. Railroads--had the advantage of the ability to operate all year long, which meant that railroads gradually replaced canals as the preferred means of moving goods and people.

3. Steam ships--the development of the steam ship with a screw propeller meant that the movement of goods and people across the oceans became both cheaper and faster. This facilitated the greatest movement of people across borders, and the transformation of colonies

II. Alienating labor


A. Enclosure of the Commons--the subsistence of peasants was fostered by their ability to use the commons to pasture livestock, collect firewood, gather nuts and berries.

1. With enclosure, activities that previously had been legal were made illegal--called “trespassing” and “theft.”

2. No pasture for livestock--enclosure prevented small farmers and their families from keeping their livestock, since they owned no property to pasture them.


B. New Landholding Patterns--before enclosure, peasant landholding was characterized by the ownership of several small strips of land. This pattern was changed by “rationalizing” landholding.


1. As peasants found it increasingly difficult to farm in this changing environment, many sold their parcels and moved to cities in the hope of being able to make a living.

2. Immiseration--economists and historians have long argued about the effect on the economic lives of those peasants who migrated from countryside to city (whether that was a short trip, or across an ocean). While conditions were less miserable in the city than in the countryside, conditions in the city were still miserable.

C. Early worker resistance



1. Luddism--workers attempted to resist industrialization by breaking the machines and burning down the factories that they concluded were making their lives more miserable. A nighttime visit from “Ned Ludd” to a factory owner’s house, or the mysterious breakage of machinery, were often “blamed” on this fictional character.




2. Chartist movement--after the repression of the Corresponding Societies, working people in the cities continued to agitate for political reforms that would create the opportunities to better their living conditions. Chartists organized huge demonstrations to agitate for the widening of suffrage rights (the “charter”), and annual parliamentary elections.

a) Chartists were strongest in the north and west of England, where industrialization had its earliest effects

b) British government responded by mobilizing the army to put down any further demonstrations (although there were none after the initial huge rallies)


D. The 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon--in France, the workers took to the streets for the first time since 1795 to protest similar conditions. In response, the restored Bourbon monarch, Charles X, abdicated the throne to the nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, and left the country.

Conclusion--the capitalist economic system is not some “natural” evolution, but a conscious choice made by humans. Many humans were not happy with this choice, and attempted to make reforms to change it. It was not until the latter 1840s, however, that these critiques gained a greater intellectual underpinning.