Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: C Knick Harley
Author-Workplace-Name: University of Oxford
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Title: British and European Industrialization
Abstract: Modern economic growth – the simultaneous increase in population and average incomes –
has been capitalism’s greatest achievement. This growth first became apparent in Britain in the 
nineteenth century and then spread to continental Europe (and the United States). The process is 
usually associated with the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the spread of British-type 
industrialization to follower economies. This chapter reviews the emergence of modern economic 
growth and suggests that the usual view is misleading in that it focuses is too limited both in 
time and in the technological change it usually emphasizes. On one hand, the of famous industries – 
textiles, iron and engineering – contributed only modestly to growth because they constituted only
a small proportion of the economy. Furthermore, the emergence of growth was much more gradual 
than traditionally understood. In new views, Britain was already a substantially industrialized 
economy with relatively high wages before the early eighteenth century. The origin of growth 
appear to lie in the ability of an economy in which both product and factor markets were well 
developed in both the rural and urban areas to partially overcome Malthusian constraints. The 
spread of growth to continental Europe is often seen as the spread of new technology of the 
British Industrial Revolution. This too seems somewhat misleading. The industries were small 
relative to the entire economies and their success depended on particular conditions. Furthermore,
just as Britain’s early success rested importantly on productive capitalist agriculture, the emerge
nce of increased incomes on the continent depended on agricultural reforms that increases in its 
productivity.
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Length: 66 pages
Creation-Date: 2013-03-06
Number: _111
File-URL: http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/12644/harley111.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
Handle: RePEc:nuf:esohwp:_111