Industrial Revolution

3 Pages 773 Words

The Industrial Revolution


The Industrial Revolution was a period in history when mankind found
innovative and efficient ways of producing goods, manufacturing services
and creating new methods of transportation. This not only revolutionized
the way the market system functioned, but also changed the way people
perceived their status in society and what they required as basic
necessities. However, the price that humanity was forced to pay for the
emergence of the Industrial Revolution greatly outweighed the rewards that
it brought alongside its origin.

Prior to the Industrial Age, the Western European market operated on a
simple "putting-out" system. The average producer was able to manufacture a
product in the same area that he or she lived on and the demand for that
product was usually set by a few local consumers. The process was easy and
simple, provided that the product being created was always required by
someone else. However, the invention of Machinery and all of its
accompanying peripherals allowed producers to start manufacturing on a mass
scale. With factories placed in central locations of the townships (known
as centralization), the previous system was dismantled and categorized into
steps. No longer would one person be required to build, market or transport
their product since the new system introduced the art of specialization.
Specialization allowed a person to perform a single task and guarantee them
wages as a source of income. However, as wonderful as this might seem, this
new system led to the emergence of a n working class (proletariat) and
forced them to depend on market conditions in order to survive as
producers. Although seemingly content at first, those who became employed
by these factories were immediately subjected to deplorable conditions.
Arnold Toynbee made a scholarly assessment of this new wave of
socio-economic behavior and concluded that the working class is suff...