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What is the Industrial Revolution? What were the economic, social, and political effects of Industrial Revolution on England?

The Industrial Revolution was a fundamental change in the way goods were produced, from human labor to machines. The more efficient means of production and subsequent higher levels of production triggered far-reaching changes to industrialized societies. The Industrial Revolution is the name given to the period in the 18th and 19th centuries when Britain was transformed from a predominantly agricultural nation into the manufacturing workshop of the world. Rapid scientific, technological and commercial innovations, a rising population, improved transportation and expanding domestic and international markets provided the context for the development of thousands of mills, factories, mines and workshops. Mining, engineering and manufacturing continued to provide employment for millions of people well into the 20th century.

Major technological developments of the Industrial revolution included:
  • Mechanized production of cloth, especially cotton.
  • The use of coke in iron smelting and wrought iron production.
  • The pudding process for making wrought iron and later, steel.
  • New chemical processes to produce sulfuric acid, sodium carbonate and other chemicals.
  • Improvements to the atmospheric steam engine to increase efficiency, speed and uniformity of motion.
  • Development of high pressure steam engines for use in factories, steamboats and later, railroads.
  • Development of more efficient water wheels.
  • Development of machine tools.
  • Development of a machinery industry.
  • Introduction of hot blast heat recovery in iron smelting.


 The economic, social, and political effects of Industrial Revolution:
 social  effects:  

 Before the Industrial Revolution, Europe was mostly an agrarian society. This means that they worked off the land to make money. Most Europeans were farmers and worked in the country. All of this changed once the Industrial Revolution started. Production became automated or done my machines and required less human labor. The automation of production all started because of an amalgamation of some great inventions. The spinning jenny invented by James Hargreaves in 1764 was a spinning machine that made it possible to produce more cotton cloth. The manufacturing and production of the steam engine done by James Watt and Matthew Bolton also increase productivity. Steam power was used in power looms which became one of the most important technologies developed in the Industrial Revolution. These power looms allowed work to be done faster and required less labor to produce the cloth. Even though these changes occurred and production became more automated, there were still some things that stayed the same. Human labor was still needed to work in the factories alongside the machines. Also the materials used to produce the cloth, cotton, was the same. Britain still had to import raw cotton from India. The automation of production definitely changed from before the Industrial Revolution but some aspects still stayed the same.

 A number of factors contributed to Britain’s role as the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution. For one, it had great deposits of coal and iron ore, which proved essential for industrialization. Additionally, Britain was a politically stable society, as well as the world’s leading colonial power, which meant its colonies could serve as a source for raw materials, as well as a marketplace for manufactured goods.
As demand for British goods increased, merchants needed more cost-effective methods of production, which led to the rise of mechanization and the factory system.
The effects of all this rapid change on society was enormous. More and more people left the land and went to towns and cities to work in factories. The growth of the towns couldn't keep up with the number of people pouring into them, and so housing was hard to get and people lived in slums in appalling circumstances.

Economic effects :
Some economic effects included:
1.   Rapid increases in technology which affects production
2.   Standardization of production processes and parts.
3.   Substantially lower transportation costs and development of improved transportation systems canals; railroads
4.   Better and cheaper intermediate good production  steel
     5.Vast increase in global trade.

The textile industry, in particular, was transformed by industrialization. Before mechanization and factories, textiles were made mainly in people’s homes (giving rise to the term cottage industry), with merchants often providing the raw materials and basic equipment, and then picking up the finished product. Workers set their own schedules under this system, which proved difficult for merchants to regulate and resulted in numerous inefficiencies. In the 1700s, a series of innovations led to ever-increasing productivity, while requiring less human energy.

Developments in the iron industry also played a central role in the Industrial Revolution. In the early 18th century, Englishman Abraham Darby  discovered a cheaper, easier method to produce cast iron, using a coke-fueled  furnace. In the 1850s, British engineer Henry Bessemer developed the first inexpensive process for mass-producing steel. Both iron and steel became essential materials, used to make everything from appliances, tools and machines, to ships ,building sand infrastructure. 

The steam engine was also integral to industrialization. 

The transportation industry also underwent significant transformation during the Industrial Revolution. Before the advent of the steam engine, raw materials and finished goods were hauled and distributed via horse-drawn wagons, and by boats along canals and rivers. In the early 1800s, American Robert Fulton built the first commercially successful steamboat, and by the mid-19th century, steamships were carrying freight across the Atlantic.

As steam-powered ships were making their debut, the steam locomotive was also coming into use. In the early 1800s, British engineer Richard Trevithick constructed the first railway steam locomotive. .

Political effects. The effects of Industrial Revolution were equally felt in the sphere of politics. The growth of large populous towns made parliamentary reform necessary as these new seats of industry were unrepresented  in parliament. The distress of the workmen under the factory system led to the chartist movement and socialistic demands for reform.

In fact these countries added so much territory to their empire that one historian has described it as "the greatest land grab movement in the history of the world." It is well known that colonialism produced adverse effects on the local people and resulted in their ruthless exploitation. However, it cannot be denied that it also paved the way for the industrialization of these territories because the European colonizers set up certain industries in these areas.

Secondly, industrial revolution sharply divided the countries. The in­dustrially advanced countries which possessed necessary finances and tech­nical know-how, invested their surplus capital in the backward countries and fully exploited their resources and crippled their industries. Thus the world came to be divided into two groups-the developed and the under­developed world, which is a cause of great tension even at present.
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.Finally, industrial revolution paved the way for the development of new social and economic doctrines.