The 10 Consequences of the Most Important Industrial Revolution

The Consequences of the Industrial Revolution Encompassed notably in almost all aspects of British society, including demography, politics, social structures and institutions, and the economy. With the growth of factories, for example, people were attracted to metropolitan centers.

The number of cities with populations of more than 20,000 in England and Wales increased from 12 in 1800 to almost 200 by the close of the century. As a specific example of the effects of technological change on demography, the growth of coke smelting resulted in a displacement of England's population centers from the south and east to the north and west.

Among the industrial revolution consequences we can find the increase of pollution levels

The technological change also made possible the growth of the capitalism . Factory owners and others who controlled the means of production quickly became very wealthy. As an indicator of economic growth inspired by new technologies, purchasing power in Britain doubled and total national income increased by a factor of ten in the years 1800 to 1900.

Such changes also brought about a revolution in the political structure of the nation. Industrial capitalists gradually replaced land-owning landowners as leaders of the nation's economy and power structure.

Working conditions were often much less than satisfactory for many of the employees in the new factory systems. Workplaces were often poorly ventilated, overcrowded, and fraught with safety hazards.

Men, women and children alike worked with living wages in unhealthy and dangerous environments. Workers often could not afford more than the simpler housing, which led to the increase of urban slums.

10 main consequences of the industrial revolution

1- Education

Before the Industrial Revolution, education was not free. Rich families could afford to send their children to school for a basic education, while poor children's education was limited to the tutorials offered at church schools on Sunday services.

However, in 1833 education received aid from the British government. The government, for the first time in history, has allocated funds to promote education in schools. He gave money to charities to help make education accessible to children in all socioeconomic divisions.

In the same year, the British government introduced laws requiring children working in factories to attend school for at least two hours a day.

In 1844, the government-run Ragged Union of Schools focused on educating poor children, while the Public Schools Act, created in 1868, brought reform to the public school system in Britain by establishing basic requirements for Educational standards.

2- New inventions and factory development

The 10 Consequences of the Most Important Industrial Revolution First Factories of the Industrial Revolution / Photo retrieved from: britishfoodhistory.wordpress.com

The industry entered a rapid growth in the nineteenth century. Production increased and there was greater demand for raw materials of all kinds, bringing with it great advances in technologies and forms of mass production.

3- Policy

Although Great Britain had become a constitutional monarchy a century earlier, the vast majority of the population remained deprived of the electoral system. As the industrial force grew along with a more forced middle class, electoral reform was a necessity to balance the power structure of the new society.

Before 1832, only 6% of the male population could vote represented by aristocrats who owned large tracts of land in the countryside and other goods.

By 1832 the owners of middle-class factories wanted political power to coincide with their newly discovered economic coup, resulting in the 1832 reform bill that granted 20 percent of the male population to vote.

The reform project also redistributed electoral districts to better reflect the large towns and cities.

4- Growth of cities

The 10 Consequences of the Most Important Industrial Revolution 1 Newcastle (1832), one of the reference cities of the Industrial Revolution as a result of its port system and blast furnaces

One of the defining characteristics and more lasting of the Industrial Revolution was the emergence of the cities. In pre-industrial society, more than 80% of the population lived in rural areas. As migrants moved from the countryside, small towns became large cities.

By 1850, for the first time in world history, more people in one country - Britain - lived in cities than in rural areas. As other countries in Europe and North America became industrialized, they also continued along this path of urbanization.

In 1920, most Americans lived in cities. In England, this process of urbanization continued unabated during the nineteenth century. The city of London grew from a population of two million in 1840 to five million forty years later.

5- Exploitation of mineral resources and increase of the work force

In order to increase production, new raw materials were needed in large quantities, so that the workforce was improved and more resources were extracted from the soil and subsoil.

6- Exploitation of children

Child labor was an integral part of the first factories and mines. In textile factories, as the new power looms and spinning mules took the place of skilled workers, factory owners used cheap, unskilled labor to lower the cost of production. And child labor was the cheapest job of all.

Some of these machines were so easy to operate that a small child could perform simple and repetitive tasks. Some maintenance tasks, such as squeezing in confined spaces, could be performed more easily by children than by adults. And, the children did not try to join the unions or go on strike. They were paid 1/10 of what the men were paid for.

The 10 Consequences of the Most Important Industrial Revolution 2 Infants workers in the Industrial Revolution / Photo retrieved from: webs.bcp.org

7- Family Roles

The Industrial Revolution completely transformed the role of the family. In the traditional farming society, families worked together as a production unit, tending the fields, knitting sweaters, or tending to the fire.

Women could now be mothers and also play a role in the production of food or goods needed for the home. Working and playing time was flexible and interwoven.

The same specialization of the work that took place in the factories occurred in the lives of working-class families, breaking the family economy.

While many factory workers were initially women, most of them were young women who would stop working when they married.

8- Highly developed banking and investment system

Thanks to advances in transportation, agriculture and communication, world trade grew, resulting in increased monetary investments for the implementation of new projects, from large factories to medium and small enterprises.

9- Wealth and Income

Historians do not agree on whether life improved for the working class in the first phase of the Industrial Revolution, from 1790 to 1850. E.P. Thompson argued in The Making of the English Working Class That life clearly did not improve for most Britons:

"The experience of misery came to them in a hundred different forms: for the field worker, the loss of their common rights and the vestiges of village democracy; For the artisan, the loss of his status as a craftsman; For the weaver, loss of livelihood and independence; For the child loss of play at home; For many groups of workers whose real gain improved, the loss of security, leisure and the deterioration of the urban environment."

10- The emerging middle class

The 10 Consequences of the Most Important Industrial Revolution 3 Great machines of the Industrial Revolution / Photo recovered from proprofs.com

Gradually, very gradually, a middle class, or"middle type,"emerged in industrial cities, mostly toward the end of the nineteenth century. Until then, there were only two main classes in society: the aristocrats born in their lives of wealth and privilege, and low-income commoners born into the working classes.

However, new urban industries gradually required more than what we now call white-collar jobs, such as entrepreneurs, merchants, bank sellers, insurance agents, traders, accountants, managers, doctors, lawyers, and teachers.

Evidence of this emerging middle class was the increase in retail stores in England, which increased from 300 in 1875 to 2,600 in 1890. Another notable distinction of the middle class was its ability to hire servants to cook and clean the house once In when

This is proof of a small but growing middle class who prided themselves on taking responsibility for themselves and their families. They saw professional success as the result of a person's energy, perseverance, and hard work.

References

  1. Publisher team. (2017). "Industrial Revolution - Effects Of The Industrial Revolution". NET Industries. Retrieved from descience.jrank.org.
  2. Publisher team. (2017). "What were the effects of the Industrial Revolution?" IAC Publishing. Retrieved from reference.com.
  3. Editorial Team"The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia"(2012). "Industrial Revolution". Columbia University Press. Retrieved from nfoplease.com.
  4. Nestor, T. (2017). "Chapter 25 - Effects of the Industrial Revolution". World History: Patterns of Interaction. Recovered from quizlet.com.
  5. Bond, E. (2003). "Impact of the Industrial Revolution". Retrieved from industrialrevolution.sea.ca.
  6. Weightman, G. (2007). "The Industrial Revolutionaries: The Making of the Modern World, 1776-1914". New York: Grove Press. Printed.
  7. Frader, L. (2006)"The Industrial Revolution: A History in Documents". Oxford: Oxford University Press. Printed.


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