d by British authorities. Francis Cabot Lowell, of Massachusetts, visited Britain from 1810 to 1812 and returned to set up the first power loom and the first factory combining mechanical spinning and weaving in the States. Railroad construction in America boomed from the 1830s to 1870s. The American Civil War (1861–65) was the first truly industrial war — the increasingly urbanized and factory-based North fighting against the agriculture-focused South — and industrialization grew explosively afterward. By 1900 the United States had overtaken Britain in manufacturing, producing 24 percent of the world’s output.
After 1870 both Russia and Japan were forced by losing wars to abolish their feudal systems and to compete in the industrializing world. In Japan, the monarchy proved flexible enough to survive through early industrialization. In Russia, a profoundly rural country, the czar and the nobility undertook industrialization while trying to retain their dominance. Factory workers often worked 13-hour days without any legal rights. Discontent erupted repeatedly, and eventually a revolution brought the Communist party to power in 1917.
Industrialized nations used their strong armies and navies to colonize many parts of the world that were not industrialized, gaining access to the raw materials needed for their factories, a practice known as imperialism. In 1800 Europeans occupied or controlled about 34 percent of the land surface of the world; by 1914 this had risen to 84 percent.
Britain led the 19th-century takeovers and ended the century with the largest noncontiguous empire the world has ever known. (“The sun never sets on the British Empire,” as the British liked to say.) Britain exerted great influence in China and the Ottoman Empire without taking over direct rule, while in India, Southeast Asia, and 60 percent of Africa, it assumed all governmental functions.
In the last decade of the 19th century most European nations grabbed for a piece of Africa, and by 1900 the only independent country left on the continent was Ethiopia. After World War II (1939–1945) Europe’s colonies demanded their independence, which didn’t always happen immediately or without conflict but eventually took root. Now, in the early 21st century, Brazil, China, and India are becoming economic powerhouses, while many European countries are enduring troubled economic times.
Workers hauling coal near Fengjie, China, 2005 © Bob Sacha/CORBIS
Consequences of the Industrial Revolution
The statistics that reflect the effects of industrialization are staggering. In 1700, before the widespread use of fossil fuels, the world had a population of 670 million people. By 2011 the world’s population had reached 6.7 billion, a 10-fold increase in a mere 300 years. In the 20th century alone, the world’s economy grew 14-fold, the per capita income grew almost fourfold, and the use of energy expanded at least 13-fold. This kind of growth has never before occurred in human history.
Many people around the world today enjoy the benefits of industrialization. With so much more energy flowing through human systems than ever before, many of us must do much less hard physical labor than earlier generations did. People today are able to feed more babies and bring them to adulthood. Many people vote and participate in modern states, which provide education, social security, and health benefits. Large numbers of people enjoy levels of wealth, health, education, travel, and life expectancy unimagined before industrialization.
The benefits of industrialization, however, have come at great cost. For one thing, the rate of change (acceleration) is now so rapid that individuals and social systems struggle to keep up. And strong arguments can be made about depersonalization in the age of mass production.
The increased complexity of the industrial system has also brought increased fragility. Industrialization depends on the interaction of many diverse components, any one of which could fail. We know that many of the essential components of the industrial system, and the natural resources it depends on, are being compromised — the soil, the oceans, the atmosphere, the underground water levels, plants, and animals are all at risk. Will growth continue unchecked, or are we approaching the end of an unsustainable industrial era? Whatever the future holds, we’ll be debating — and dealing with — the consequences of modernization for years to come.
By Cynthia Stokes Brown
For Further Discussion
The innovations of the Industrial Revolution transformed textile production. Can you think of innovations today in some other industry that are transforming that industry and changing the way humans live? Share your answer in the Questions Area below. Then, respond to someone else’s answer, commenting on the characteristics of that transformation that either make it similar to or different from what happened in the
