Industrializati on and Global Capitalism
Jan 01, 2016
Industrialization and Global Capitalism
Life before the Industrial Revolution
• After the Revolutions in America, France, and Latin America changed the way government worked, the Industrial Revolution changed the way people did work.
• This begs the question “If this changed the way people worked…How did they work before the Industrial Revolution?”
Industrialization fundamentally changed how goods were
produced
Industrial Revolution
• Period from 1750 to 1850 where changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times.
• It began in the United Kingdom, then subsequently spread throughout Western Europe, North America, Japan, and eventually the rest of the world.
Why Great BritainWhy did the most important economic change since the
Agricultural revolution begin on this Island?
Why Britain – One More Time
• Europe’s location on the Atlantic Ocean• The geographical distribution of coal, iron and timber• European demographic changes• Urbanization• Improved agricultural productivity• Legal protection of private property• An abundance of rivers and canals• Access to foreign resources• The accumulation of capital
Industrial Revolution Essentials
• Origin in England, because of its natural resources like coal, iron ore, and the invention and improvement of the steam engine
• Spread to Europe and the United States• Role of cotton textile, iron, and steel industries• Relationship to the British Enclosure Movement• Rise of the factory system and demise of cottage
industries• Rising economic powers that wanted to control
raw materials and markets throughout the world
Innovation Spurs Progress
Technological advances that produced the Industrial Revolution
• James Hargreaves - Spinning jenny• James Watt—Steam engine• Eli Whitney—Cotton gin• Henry Bessemer—Process for making steel
Watt’s Steam Engine
Internal Combustion Engine
Advancements in science and medicine
• Edward Jenner—Developed smallpox vaccination
• Louis Pasteur—Discovered bacteria
Enter the FactoryProduction is centralized into one building
• Industrial Factory – Chief means of organizing labor around the new machines
Impacts of the Industrial Revolution on industrialized countries
• Population increase• Increased standards of living for many, though not
all• Improved transportation• Urbanization• Environmental pollution• Increased education• Dissatisfaction of working class with working
conditions• Growth of the middle class
The nature of work in the factory system
• Family-based cottage industries displaced by the factory system
• Harsh working conditions with men competing with women and children for wages
• Child labor that kept costs of production low and profits high
• Owners of mines and factories who exercised considerable control over the lives of their laborers
• The development of the factory system concentrated labor in a single location and led to an increasing degree of specialization of labor
Second Industrial Revolution
• As the new methods of industrial production became more common in parts of northwestern Europe, they spread to other parts of Europe and the United States, Russia, and Japan
• The “second Industrial revolution” led to new methods in the production of steel, chemicals, electricity and precision machinery during the second half of the nineteenth century.
New patterns of global trade and production developed and further integrated the global economy as
industrialists sought raw materials and new markets for the increasing
amount and array of goods produced in their factories
• The need for raw materials for the factories and increased food supplies for the growing population in urban centers led to the growth of export economies around the world that specialized in mass producing single natural resources – Cotton– Rubber – Palm oil– Sugar– Wheat– Meat– Guano– Metals– Minerals
The profits from these raw materials were used to purchase finished goods
Industrial Impact Abroad • The rapid development of industrial production
contributed to the decline of economically productive, agriculturally based economies– Textile industry in India
• The rapid increases in productivity caused by industrial production encouraged industrialized states to seek out new consumer markets – British and French attempts to "open up" Chinese
markets during the nineteenth century for their finished goods.
Need…• The need for specialized and limited metals
for industrial production, as well as the global demand for gold, silver and diamonds as forms of wealth, led to the development of extensive mining centers – Copper in Mexico– Gold and diamonds in South Africa
To facilitate investments at all levels of industrial production,
financiers developed and expanded various financial
institutions
Capitalism
• The ideological inspiration for economic changes lies in the development of capitalism and classical liberalism associated with Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill
Financial Instruments
• Stock markets• Insurance• Gold Standard• Limited Liability Corporations
Large-scale Transnational Businesses
• The global nature of trade and production contributed to the proliferation of large-scale transnational businesses – United Fruit Company,– The HSBC- Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking
Corporation
There were major developments in transportation and
communication
Developments in Transportation and Communication
• Railroads• Steamships• Telegraphs• Canals
The development and spread of global capitalism led to a
variety of responses
Impact of the Industrial Revolution on slavery
• The cotton gin increased demand for slave labor on American plantations.
• The United States and Britain outlawed the slave trade and then slavery.
Social effects and Reforms of the Industrial Revolution
• Women and children entering the workplace as cheap labor
• Introduction of reforms to end child labor• Expansion of public education• State pensions and public health (Germany)• Increased male suffrage (Britain)• Women’s increased demands for suffrage
Child Labor
The rise of labor unions
• Encouraged worker-organized strikes to increase wages and improve working conditions
• Lobbied for laws to improve the lives of workers, including women and children
• Wanted worker rights and collective bargaining between labor and management
Capitalism
• Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations• Role of market competition and
entrepreneurial abilities• Impact on standard of living and the growth of
the middle class• Dissatisfaction with poor working conditions
and the unequal distribution of wealth in society
• In industrialized states, many workers organized themselves to improve working conditions, limit hours, and gain higher wages, while others opposed capitalist exploitation of workers by promoting alternative visions
Utopian Socialism
• Exemplified by the work of Henri de Saint-Simon, Charles Fourier, and Robert Owen
• Inspired Karl Marx and other early socialists• Generally don't feel class struggle or political
revolutions are necessary to implement their ideas; that people of all classes might voluntarily adopt their plan for society if it were presented convincingly
Socialism and communism
• Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto (written with Friedrich Engels) and Das Capital
• Response to the injustices of capitalism• Importance of redistribution of wealth to the
communists
Other Responses• In Qing China and the Ottoman Empire, some
members of the government resisted economic change and attempted to maintain preindustrial forms of economic production– China’s Self-Strengthening Movement
• In a small number of states, governments promoted their own state-sponsored visions of industrialization – Economic reforms of Meiji Japan– Developments of factories and railroads in Czarist
Russia– Muhammad Ali’s development of cotton textile
industry in Egypt
The ways in which people organized themselves into societies
also underwent significant transformations in industrialized
states due to the fundamental restructuring of the global
economy
• New social class, including the middle class and the industrial working class developed
• Family dynamics, gender roles, and demographics changed in response to urbanization
• Rapid urbanization that accompanied global capitalism often led to unsanitary conditions as well as to new forms of community– Tenement housing
Final Thoughts
• Industrialization fundamentally altered the production of goods around the world.
• It not only changed how goods were produced and consumed, as well as what was considered a “good,” but it also had far-reaching effects on the global economy, social relations, and culture.
• Although it is common to speak of an “Industrial Revolution,” the process of industrialization was a gradual one that unfolded over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, eventually becoming global.