A note on “industrial revolution(s)”

When one realizes that the “industrial revolution” began in the United Kingdom in the eighteenth century and continues to evolve in the present, one might question the use of the term “revolution.” Nonetheless, this course will follow the definitions of the various industrial revolutions for the U.S. and Western Europe as noted in Thomas K. McCraw’s book, American Business, 1920-2000: How It Worked (p. 9). The following is a summary/adaptation of those definitions.

A Watt steam engine in Madrid. The development of the steam engine propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the world. The steam engine was created to pump water from coal mines, enabling them to be deepened beyond groundwater levels

The First Industrial Revolution began in the 1760s in the UK and continued to the mid-nineteenth century in western societies. Human, water, wind, and animal-power sources, which had sustained market or merchant capitalism during the American colonial period, were supplemented by coal-powered engines, which enabled businesses to produce more products. Increased production in factories furnished more products and lowered prices to consumers, especially in textiles. Supply and demand forces continued to shape the economy for the most part. Transportation modes—roads, canals, early railways, clipper ships in ocean trade—supported increased production.

internal combustion engine

The Second Industrial Revolution began in the 1840s and extended for nearly a century in time. Infrastructure developments (trans-regional and transcontinental railways, telegraph, telephone, and electric and natural gas networks) and new transport modes (autos, trucks, buses, and airplanes), which were powered by electric and internal combustion motors, underlay the emergence of big business, mass production, and mass distribution. The new technologies in transportation, communication, and manufacturing and expansion in the scope of markets (from local to regional to national and international) required managers to devise new business strategies and firm structures and new labor relations to keep their companies competitive. The advent of new business strategies also shaped market forces to create a more consumer-oriented economy.

The Third Industrial Revolution is a controversial term; some scholars do not employ it; some use “post-industrial” labels. Nonetheless, we can detect a shift in capitalism, beginning in the mid-twentieth century, that was driven less by technological improvements in energy production or transportation and communication and more by shifts in employment patterns. As manufacturing became even more efficient, in part because of reliance on new information systems and more efficient management, the service sector of the economy grew larger than the manufacturing sector. Science (electronics, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, computer hardware and software) drove much of the expansion of the market during the Third Industrial Revolution.