The Process of Modernization and the Industrial Revolution in England

Abstract

Industrial Revolution in England Modernization and industrialization are terms widely used in descriptions of the changes which have occurred in Western societies over the last two or three centuries. Whether they represent concepts able to sustain adequately the explanatory and descriptive loads borne by them is disputable. Yet they enjoy very wide currency and form the most convenient point of departure for a general discussion of the Industrial Revolution in England. In this essay I shall describe a view of the relationship between modernization and industrialization which seems to me to be both widespread and unfortunate when applied to the Industrial Revolution in England. In particular, I shall argue that the connection between the two is contingent rather than necessary. I shall begin by offering brief definitions of modernization and industrialization as a preliminary to a discussion of the way in which the assumptions which underlie the use of the terms have clouded our appreciation of the Industrial Revolution. The definitions will serve to introduce both a discussion of the views of percipient contemporaries, especially Adam Smith and Karl Marx, and an examination of some features of the Industrial Revolution itself. I have tried to present the definitions in the form in which they are most widely held-what might be called highest common factor definitions. This means a loss of rigor, but it conforms to the requirements of the essay. At times, it will be evident that the definitions of modernization and industrialization offered are used as stalking horses as much as chargers, underlining the point that they are at once convenient and yet inadequate.