5.2: Cultural and Political Effects of the Industrial Revolution in the Industrialized World

Social Transformation

Economic modernization resulted in major social tensions in the industrialized world. While the middle class grew, urban poverty had increased as well, and with it, political instability.  Nevertheless, governments adapted to the changing times and addressed many of the new problems created by the Industrial Revolution.

The industrial revolutions transformed social structures. There were the new mega-rich industrialists and bankers. Now, wealth was far less dependent on ownership of land.  With the expanding economy, there was a need for college-educated middle-class professionals such as engineers, lawyers, accountants, doctors, dentists, merchants, bankers, teachers, architects, nurses, and white-collar civil servants. Many professions were now certified with specialized education such as medicine, law, and education.  Following the example of China, civil service exams were used in most of Western Europe. Governments claimed to staff bureaucracies with men based on talent and merit rather than birth.  Overall, this emerging middle class based its status on wealth and education instead of birth and titles.

The other major class that emerged was the working class who were typically factory workers, construction workers, and miners. Increasingly, Europe’s working class lived and worked in cities but were at first peasant migrants from rural areas. Their living and working environment were drastically different. For one, working in a factory required regimented discipline. There were bells to start and end work and designated break periods. In the countryside, these workers were free to set their own pace. Secondly, the agricultural worker in Europe had a personal relationship with their landlord. Theoretically, the European peasant lived in a moral economy where the landlord knew the worker by name and oftentimes assumed a moral obligation for the wellbeing of his workers. The farm worker had a sense of loyalty to the landowner. In the cities, this moral economy broke down. The factory worker had no relationship with the factory owner and the factory owner felt no obligation to ensure that the basic needs of the worker and his family were taken care of. Therefore, the factory worker had little loyalty to his employer.  Cities were often unprepared to receive so many people so quickly. Inadequate housing, sanitation, and transportation contributed to cholera outbreaks, environmental degradation, and psychological stress.

Additionally, many skilled craftsmen lost their jobs. The new factory jobs required less skill than artisanal craftwork, especially when the worker was making a larger number of standardized products. Previously, a carpenter needed to be a skilled craftsman to design and assemble, for instance, a custom-built chair, but with industrialization, a less-skilled lathe operator could turn out large quantities of legs that could be assembled into any number of chairs of a standard pattern. Worker’s wages would almost always be lower.

Ideologies of the 1800s

During the 1800s, the ideas of the Atlantic Revolutions, such as liberalism and nationalism, continued to spread and more people began to organize into nation-states. A nation-state is a specific ethnic or cultural group (a nation) that has a common government within specific geographic boundaries. In most cases, national governments were formed before a strong national identity took root. So, national governments sought to create culturally homogenous loyal citizens by compelling diverse communities and regions to accept unified time zones, laws, national markets, and a single language or dialect.  Also, the government established public education and universal military service as a means of creating a stronger sense of national identity. Governments also promoted national histories, national holidays, national anthems, national flags, and national heroes to unify the nation-state. The new nation-states used technology such as the railroad, the steam-powered ship, the steam-powered printing press, and the telegraph to unite their countries.  These national governments wanted their citizens to be loyal to them before any local or regional governments.  So, in the USA people from South Carolina would be more loyal to the US government than their state and they would identify as Americans first. In Germany, Bavarians would identify themselves as German first and their loyalty would be to the German Empire. More and more countries adopted constitutional rule with elected legislatures that approved laws and taxes. However, most of these new nation-states were not democracies. In some cases, the elected officials lacked power (Germany and Japan), elections were fixed (Chile and Brazil), or large segments of the population could not vote (USA). In fact, women did not receive voting rights until after 1900 almost everywhere. 

New ideas, such as Social Darwinism, emerged in the 1800s. Charles Darwin, a British biologist, traveled throughout the Pacific Ocean and concluded that God did not create each species. Instead, the different species evolved under the uniform pressure of natural laws. According to Darwin, populations grew faster than food supplies which then created competition within and between species for survival. According to Darwin, the fittest survived to reproduce while the least adaptable did not reproduce. Many elites and the middle class embraced Darwin’s theories of evolution and applied them to society. These Social Darwinists concluded that Darwin’s theories justified the right of the ruling class to dominate everyone else. The Social Darwinists argued that wealthy people were hardworking and intelligent while the poor were lazy and unintelligent.  They concluded that government-funded education and healthcare for the poor would perpetuate the survival of the weak and unfit. Many Social Darwinists also supported scientific racism by claiming that Europeans had the right to rule others because they had evolved more than Africans or Asians.  Some read “survival of the fittest” to mean that it was natural for stronger industrialized nations to dominate less industrialized ones.

Radicalism also emerged at this time. The term radical refers to those who sought a total reconfiguration of society. They believed that the Atlantic Revolutions had not gone far enough, because these revolutions only brought about political transformation. Radicals were critical of their governments because they did not address the pressing issues of poverty and inequality introduced by the Industrial Revolution.  According to these radicals, the government needed to redistribute wealth. The most influential radicals were Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels who developed radical socialism (Communism or Marxism). Figure 5.2.1 depicts the pyramid of the capitalist system. The image is a caricature of American capitalist society. At the top of the pyramid is wealth, which is most accessible to the government and rich people. Below them are religious leaders and military personnel who encourage workers to be obedient and accept the status quo. Under the military, but above the working class, we see the bourgeoisie who exploit workers and enjoy the profits of their labor. The caption for the bourgeoisie reads, "We eat for you."  At the very bottom are workers who bear the weight of the entire system. The captions for the working class read, "We feed all" and "We work for all." The caption next to the soldiers reads, “We shoot at you,” and the caption next to the religious leaders reads, “We fool you.” What is the function of government and religion according to this picture? What would happen if workers withdrew their support for the system?

Marx and Engels believed that over time the economic system would create move poverty which would then result in a revolution, and workers would then take over the government.  Was Marxism a serious threat in the industrialized world in the 1800s? With the breakdown of the moral economy, the worker had little loyalty to his employer. Workers tried to improve working conditions and raise wages by coming together and forming unions. These unions would then go on strike to demand these improvements. However, governments at first would back up employers and use force to break up the strikes and the unions. Therefore, the worker had little loyalty to the government which usually sided with their employer. The fear among the elites and middle classes was that workers would find radical socialism appealing. This radicalization of the working class was known as the “social question.”

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Pyramid of Capitalist System by Industrial Worker of the World, in the Public Domain

There was no successful socialist revolution in the 1800s as Marx predicted. For the most part, the standard of living for workers in the industrialized world improved. There were some very practical concerns. In the 1840s, the British military rejected four out of ten men because they were too sickly to serve in the military.  Governments recognized that poor working conditions and living standards posed a threat to national security.  Additionally, more and more medical experts argued that disease in the cities was largely the result of a lack of clean air, water, and sunshine. 

By the mid-1800s, a new generation of politicians believed that some government regulation was necessary to protect workers and consumers.  Overall, governments enforced sanitary standards which made urban living cleaner and healthier. Governments cleaned up the cities with sewers and waste disposal. Running water and bathing became common by 1900. The British government passed the National Insurance Act of 1911 in which workers, employers, and the state all made payments for worker sickness and unemployment. Mandatory vaccinations were also introduced. Additionally, voting rights made workers less radical, because they felt they had a voice in government and could improve their lives through peaceful democratic means.

As a result of these changes, more and more socialists in Western Europe no longer supported a revolution.  They believed that change could occur by working gradually and peacefully within the system.  These socialists supported a system called democratic or evolutionary socialism with a progressive income tax, government regulation, a safety net for the poor, the right to form unions, and minimum wages. The democratic socialists competed in elections and sought change peacefully through the legislatures. So, in western Europe there would not be a successful radical socialist revolution, because the social question was being addressed. The USA had a powerful progressive movement that shared many of the aims of the evolutionary socialists.

Review Questions

• What industrial conflicts flared up during the Industrial Revolution?
• Why was there no successful radical socialist revolution in the industrialized world?