Industrial Revolutions

A key feature of industrialization has been the widespread use of carbon-based fuels, unlocking millions of years of stored solar energy for use in just a few centuries. This has given human beings immense creative power, but also lies at the root of the climate crisis. Optimistic observers of early industrialism hoped that the limitless power of coal could fundamentally transform the human condition, a hope which has thus far proved elusive.

Great Britain was the first national economy to undergo extensive industrialization, and it was there that the earliest key technologies were invented and widely used. The most important of these was the steam engine, which turned heat from burning coal into mechanical energy that could be used by factory machines to do immense amount of work. Combined with a variety of other factors (whose relative importance is much debated by historians), this technology enabled rapid transformation of a number of industries, most famously textiles. By the early decades of the 19th century, English cities were awash with mechanized factories, crewed by wage laborers who often lived in extreme poverty. Owners of industrial factories, on the other hand, could accumulate enormous riches, often eclipsing the fortunes of aristocratic and mercantile families that had formed the economic elites of previous generations. As industrialism spread, first to a small number of European and colonial states, and eventually around the world, the basic pairing of accumulation and immiserating was widely replicated.

The new wealth and the new urban poverty, twin results of a novel pattern of exploitation, also combined to create new forms of generosity. While early British and American efforts to alleviate poverty relied on established modes of charity, especially Christian churches, wealthy individuals took an an increasingly important role as their fortunes grew in the period leading up to the World Wars of the Twentieth Century. The modern meaning of the word “philanthropy” dates to this period, and reflects the hope that targeted generosity could not only alleviate individual suffering, but eliminate at least some of the root causes of suffering and misery.

The expansive philanthropic programs of the early twentieth century were “acts of generosity and hubris on a scale never before entertained,” according to at lest one historian (Zunz, Oliver 2012, 8) At the same time, working-class movements organized new forms of mutual aid among the poor themselves, while others sought to transform the role of the state in securing the welfare of citizens and workers. In important ways, the systems of philanthropic, state-sponsored, and peer-organized generosity that populate the globe today are descended directly from the great transformations of industrialization. This is even more true if we take into account the extent to which industrialism was tied to imperialism and colonialism, and the patterns of generosity that have emerged from those relationships.

Contributor: Matt Price