Industrial Revolution Stages, Causes, Labor Movements and Ideas

Industrial Revolution: Stages and Social Change

Stage 1: Early industrial changes in Great Britain

Stage 1 started in Great Britain. The first changes occurred in the forms of production with new energy sources, the use of machinery and the concentration of workers in factories. The development of transport resulted in a better distribution of raw materials and manufactured goods. The Industrial Revolution then spread to other European countries.

Stage 2: Spread, finance, inventions and social shifts

Stage 2 saw the Industrial Revolution spread further to other European countries, the United States and Japan. Using new forms of business financing, many inventions were developed and applied. Modern energy sources, such as electricity, were introduced. Social classes were reshaped: there was a shift away from the old estate-based order toward class divisions highlighted by the bourgeoisie and industrial workers (the proletariat).

Causes of the Industrial Revolution

The main causes included:

• Agricultural revolution (the rev. farm) that increased productivity
• Population growth and an expanding labor force
• Trade expansion and access to wider markets
• Improvements in transport that lowered costs and sped distribution

Basic principles and driving forces

Basic principles or drivers included: work and labor; personal interest and incentive; general economic activity; the role of governments; and increased international trade and the movement of products.

The worker movement: problems and demands

The emerging worker movement responded to harsh conditions. Typical problems included:

• Long workdays
• No safety measures or hygiene in factories
• Child labor
• Low wages
• Frequent layoffs
• No paid vacation
• No social security
• Legal prohibitions against organization (trade unions were often illegal)

Luddite movement: machine-breaking protests

Luddites were groups of workers who destroyed machines in protest against the effects of mechanization on their livelihoods.

Trade unions and Chartism

Trade unions were local associations of workers in similar trades or offices seeking better pay, conditions and legal recognition; for a time these associations were often illegal. Chartism expressed workers' demands for political and social reforms, including expanded suffrage and improved labor rights.

Utopian socialism and state intervention

Utopian socialism advocated state or collective intervention in the economy to improve conditions for workers and to design ideal social arrangements to reduce inequality.

Marxism: class struggle and revolutionary change

Marxism, developed from the thinking of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, proposed a political and economic theory based on class struggle. Marx and Engels argued that the working class would confront the bourgeoisie, overthrow capitalist relations, and seize political power to establish the "dictatorship of the proletariat." This transitional state would eventually lead to a classless society in which there were no longer oppressors or oppressed.

Anarchism and the ideas of Bakunin

Anarchism is a political theory that, in its classic form, opposed any centralized government as a source of coercion and injustice. Prominent anarchist thinkers included Mikhail Bakunin. Anarchists defended individual freedom, the disappearance of all authorities and the abolition of private ownership of the means of production. Their preferred social organization was often based on small, self-sufficient communities in which private property would not exist. Most anarchists used peaceful methods, although some resorted to violent acts, including targeted assassinations of political figures and government members.