Chapter 18: The Beginning of the Industrial Revolution

An interesting concept that I read and had never considered before was the Why Europe? section. In this section the textbook poses the question of why was Europe the first place to industrialize and be the birthplace for the industrial revolution. I had never considered this idea. There were many other areas, like India and China that were just as technologically advanced if not more than the European nations. Experts have dissected the various possibilities of why this may be, but they have only come up with theories.
When the situation is looked at closely, there is no real reason as to why Europe was the first area geographically to industrialize. Other areas of the world experienced times of technological and scientific greatness. For example, the Islamic world generated major advances in shipbuilding, power, papermaking, textile production, and much more. In other areas there were similar advances, in India, there was the world center of cotton textile production, sugar production from sugar cane, and mathematical inventions. In the same note, China was clearly the world leader in technological innovation. However, all of these places of technology slowed down considerably by the early modern era, which was when the change in European technology began to pick up.
Historians have tried to describe this phenomenon, but have only formulated theories. They believe that it has to do with the patterns or Europe’s internal development that favored innovation. The many tiny nations that makeup Europe was constantly competing against each other, which fueled the industrial revolution. In places like Asia the nations are larger and more segregated. Another reason could be the monarch’s desperate need for revenue, which pushed them into an alliance with their merchant classes. It was an interest of the government to encourage commerce and innovation, and in some ways the merchant classes began to take over the states.
I found this to be very interesting, and like I mentioned earlier I did not ever consider the other parts of the world, or the reasoning as to why Europe was the first to industrialize. In all consideration, I would have expected China to be the first to industrialize because they were the most technologically advanced in the early modern era. However, when it came down to the industrialization, Europe took the first step and led the way, and more specifically England, which happened to be the one of Europe’s smallest nations.