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How the Industrial Revolution Led to the Changing of the Guard in 19th and 20th Century Europe
Aaron Fisk
Dr. Georgiadis
November 15, 2008
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During the 1700’s Spain, France, Great Britain, and the Dutch Netherlands controlled Europe. These countries had taken to heart the idea of imperialism, which had been about for thousands of years. Each country was scrambling to become self sufficient, so that they would not need to rely on neighboring countries to lend them materials, raw or finished. The idea behind self-sufficiency is that once an empire, country, or state, should be able to produce everything it needs to survive it will no longer depend on others for loans of any sort and cannot go into debt. The economic theory supporting self-sufficiency is mercantilism. Mercantilist thought states that, “specie (gold and silver) could be acquired with a 'favorable' balance of trade, that is, through earning foreign exchange by selling exports that brought in more money than was paid out for imports” (Scott (Online)). A “favorable balance of trade” would allow for a country to keep a surplus and keep them out of dept. The countries that were almost able to achieve a level of self-sufficiency were Great Britain and Germany. Through the vast amounts of resources found in each countries domains, ability to transport and refine them, and number of bodies able to complete these tasks, Germany and Great Britain were able to climb to the top of the power ladder in 19th to 20th century Europe.
Rulers knew that their countries would need places outside their territories to bring in supplies and materials that were not common inside their borders. This is the main reason for imperialist ways in the 16th-18th centuries. Land was conquered in the Americas, Africa, and Asia to supply European nations with what they could not procure or produce in their own homeland.
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The county most successful in creating an empire was Great Britain. Under supervision, British conquerors/settlers were able to start colonies in all corners of the world that sent goods back to Britain. To keep this flow coming in, British rulers enforced what became known as Navigation Acts. Examples of these acts included, “Foreign built or owned ships were forbidden to trade with the colonies, and ships that
did engage in this trade must have crews, 3/4ths of whose members were British (from Great Britain or British North America)” (Scott). Also, “Colonial imports had to shipped through Great Britain” (Scott). This did not allow Britain to become completely self-sufficient, but they came closer than any other imperialist nation in Europe.
Another nation state came to power through a completely different set of circumstances. This nation was the collective group of provinces who united to form the German Confederation. Before 1815, the area known today as Germany was a part of the dying Holy Roman Empire. At the time the emperor had almost no control over his domain, and instead provincial nobles ruled it. In 1815, these princes realized that to continue to control their lands, they would need to loosely ally themselves. The German Federal Act of 1815 created this alliance. Germany was now ready to play a major role in European, and world affairs, and play their part they did.
Britain and Germany both had vast amounts of raw materials and resources ready for use. Being such a small island nation, it would seem odd that this country would have many resources at hand, but adding to the materials in Britain were those of their colonies. For Germany, importing resources was unnecessary. Located in the southwestern area of the nation was the Ruhr valley.
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According to Merriman’s A History of Modern Europe, “Coal mining and iron production developed in the Ruhr Basin in western Prussia, which had half of the coal
riches of the entire continent” (Merriman 570). Local coal mining and iron production was key to Germany’s rise to power in European affairs, as they had not been a part of the rush for empires of the earlier centuries. This meant that they would not have all the imports of a country like Britain or France. Therefore, any wealth, whether industrial or not, would have to come from inside the borders.
Britain did not have such a large area as the German Confederation. There was a fair amount of raw materials to be found in the small island nation. According to Merriman’s A History of Modern Europe, “By 1800, Britain was extracting about 90 percent of the world’s coal” (Merriman 401). This large amount of coal found at such an early time allowed the British to get a jump-start industrializing their country. The coal powered factories across the island that stored raw goods imported from the colonies and produced finished products to export back.
From the Americas, Britain received large amounts of short staple cotton. This was transported to factories all across the country to be turned into clothing and shipped out for profits. Cotton shipments also came in rapidly from India. “The amount of raw cotton imported from India increased by twenty times between 1750 and 1800” (Merriman 400). Then, in the mid-19th century, British merchants found that Egyptian lands produced an even better material known as long staple cotton. “In the 1850’s and 1860’s, however, Manchester was anxious to secure alternative sources of supply and local merchants, both individually and collectively, appeared to devote considerable
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attention to West Africa” (Ratcliffe 88). In its truest definition, this is not self-sufficiency. Britain did not have everything they needed domestically. It did not matter, as each
colony, from Africa to Asia to the Americas, provided them with goods they needed to keep their factories full. Again the navigation acts come into play here as one states that, “Colonial imports had to shipped through Great Britain” (Scott). British merchants had a monopoly on colonial exports, so they could take as much profit from each shipment as possible, building up revenue for the crown. These two different strategies for building wealth both achieved the ends they were meant to, but what good would they be if there was no way to make them into finished materials ready for market. This is where the transportation and industrialization within each country comes into play.
Since the defeat of the Spanish Armada in the English Channel in 1588, Britain was easily the most dominant naval power in the world. Other countries had naval forces as well, but being an island nation, it was essential to the British that they have a large group of maritime merchant ships, and a force large enough to protect them. This led to a policy known as the two-power standard that came about around 1860. “The two-power standard set as a goal that the British navy be as large (or perhaps a bit larger than the next two largest navies in the world” (Stoll 267). From this strategy it is easily seen that the British would be able to enforce Navigation Acts within their colonies, and protect import shipment from them. With these goods coming in at such a high rate, British factory cities sprang up quickly. Examples of these cities were Manchester and Liverpool.
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Not only did the British have ease transporting goods from around the world, but once they got to domestic shores, there was no delay dispersing them to different factories around the island.
England’s water transportation was also unmatched in Europe…coal extracted in northeastern England could be transported in relative ease along the coast. No part of England stands more than seventy miles from the sea. Navigable rivers facilitated the transportation of raw materials and manufactured goods; so did canals built in the middle decades of the (19th) century, including a ninety-mile-long canal linking Manchester to the Mersey River and the Irish Sea. (Merriman 401)
England’s small size allowed it to move goods and products quickly around the countryside. Not only did they utilize a great network of waterways, but also by 1851, Britain contained one of the most complex networks of railways. (Map Principal British Railway Lines). By the 1850’s, a railway linked every major city to the rest of the island nation.
Not to be outdone by their counterparts, Germany, who industrialized decades later than the British, completed their major rail lines about the same time. (Map Principal Continental Railway Lines). Perhaps the most influential act in Germany’s rise to power was the introduction of the “German Customs Union” or Zollverein.
In 1815 a group of German princes signed the German Federal Act, which stated that, “for Europe’s peace and equilibrium, have agreed to unite themselves into a durable confederation, and have, to this end, endowed their envoys and delegates with plenary
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powers” (German Federal Act 1). This act allowed for a more powerful German state that would unite in times of need to protect similar interests. In times of peace, things were different. Tariffs between the states themselves didn’t encourage much trade, or anything else, as well as hindering the growth of industry in the states. The Zollverein changed that completely.
“The German Customs Union [Zollverein] was founded in 1834 under Prussian leadership and aimed at breaking down tariff barriers and encouraging free trade among the member states. At the same time, it also aimed to protect fledgling German industry by agreeing on common tariffs on foreign imports” (Beneficial Results of Protectionism). With the formation of the Zollverein, German industry and trade was allowed to flourish. Each state had something to bring to the table. Cities like Bremen and Hamburg had access to the North Sea, which allowed for international trade routes. Others in the Ruhr Valley Basin had the raw materials. Factories everywhere in between were able to produce the completed materials to be transported to market.
This ability to transport and refine these raw materials brought in from everywhere allowed for Great Britain and Germany to both build up revenue and materials needed to compete in the world’s marketplace. A huge population increase in the 19th century also allowed them to man each post necessary to complete this process. From miners to factory workers to transportation, no post was lacking of manpower to keep this boom from stopping.
According to Carlo Cipolla’s The Fontana History of Europe: Vol. 3, The Industrial Revolution Great Britain had an population increase of about ten million (10.9-
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20.9) people between 1800 and 1850. In that time German population increased from twenty-four point five to thirty-one point seven million. This population increase meant that no matter how many jobs sprang up around the country, there would always be someone able to step into that position.
After 1850, because of the aforementioned abilities, Germany and Great Britain were able to become the dominant powers in Europe. Like other times, there may have been no real consequence or benefits from this change in power, but the killing of the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand to begin World War One, there was an enormous consequence. Without the unification and industrialization of Germany in the 19th century, this action could have had no large effects. Austria had no real allies other than the German state. They themselves were one of the weakest powers in Europe at the time, so there would have been no real reason for anyone to worry about them causing a major problem to other nations. Germany on the other hand, was a major power by this time, and their alliance with Austria-Hungary forced them to step in on their behalf.
Without British intervention, German forces may have overrun all of Europe. At the outset of the war Germany had almost unlimited resources because of their industrialization. There was not a single country in continental Europe that would have had the power to stop them. This is where Britain’s industry came into play. They were able to stifle the German attack and hold their advancement until the United States joined the Allied effort. Without the resources gained during the 19th century this would never have happened, and Europe could be known as Germany right now.
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Britain and Germany’s rise to power was achieved through different means, but if only one way succeeded, the imbalance it could have caused may have been catastrophic. As it happened though each canceled the other out to a point where the balance remained, and a very stable Europe emerged to stay, as it does today.
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Works Cited
Primary Sources
"Beneficial Results of Protectionism." Cartoon. Bildarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz. 1.
Cipolla, Carlo M. Estimated Populations of Various European Countries From 100 to 1850. Raw data.
German Federal Act, 1 (1815).
"Principal British Railway Lines, 1851." Map. A History of Modern Europe. 2nd ed. New York, NY: W.W. Norton and Company. 561.
"Principal Continental Railway Lines 1851." Map. A History of Modern Europe. 2nd ed. New York, NY: W.W. Norton and Company. 563.
Secondary Sources
Cotton Imperialism: Manchester Merchants and Cotton Cultivation in West Africa in the Mid-Nineteenth Century. Barrie M. Ratcliffe African Economic History, No. 11 (1982), pp. 87-113.
Merriman, John M. A History of Modern Europe Vol. 1 : From the Renaissance to the Present. 2nd ed. Boston: W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated, 2004.
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Scott, Carole E. "Mercantilism and the American Revolution." 1997. 15 Nov. 2008 .
Steaming in the Dark? Rules, Rivals, and the British Navy, 1860-1913. Richard J. Stoll The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Jun., 1992), pp. 263-283.
Bibliography
Droysen, Johann G. “Speech to the Frankfurt Assembly, 1848.” Frankfurt Assembly. German States, Frankfurt. 1848.
Inikori, Joseph E. Africans and the Industrial Revolution in England: A Study in International Trade and Economic Development. New York: Cambridge UP, 2002.
Naegle, Wolfgang. "Industrialization in Germany." Virtuelle geographische Texte. 15 Nov. 2008 .
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