New Explanation For the Industrial Revolution 504
Pcol writes "The New York Times is running a story on Dr. Gregory Clark's book 'A Farewell to Alms,' which offers a new explanation for the Industrial Revolution and the affluence it created. Dr. Clark, an economic historian at the University of California Davis, postulates that the surge in economic growth that occurred first in England around 1800 came about because of the strange new behaviors of nonviolence, literacy, long working hours, and a willingness to save. Clark's research shows that between 1200 and 1800, the rich had more surviving children than the poor and that he postulates that this caused constant downward social mobility as the poor failed to reproduce themselves and the progeny of the rich took over their occupations. 'The modern population of the English is largely descended from the economic upper classes of the Middle Ages,' Clark concludes. Work hours increased, literacy and numeracy rose, and the level of interpersonal violence dropped. Around 1790, a steady upward trend in production efficiency caused a significant acceleration in the rate of productivity growth that at last made possible England's escape from the Malthusian trap."
Rich replacing the poor? (Score:4, Informative)
The ideas taking hold, on the other hand, have been noticed before, but I agree with the old-fashioned historians who say religion was responsible for that. The power of the state to enforce religious values all the way from the top to the street created a new culture, even among the poor. The king or government's incentive? A less violent population is less likely to cause problems later. Encourage the idea of non-violence in the poor and turning the other cheek, and you can avoid usurpers rallying an army or peasant-lead revolts. Encourage the ideals of hard-work to get more value of the land you own. Saving money by using the church owned banks.
Eventually, society learns to depend on the state instead of family bonds for their security and to enforce contracts, and you start to see a modern world of high mobility and capital flow (you no longer HAD to marry the miller's daughter to get the miller to invest in your factory).
Re:From the article.... (Score:3, Informative)
And if the major population-culler wasn't a disease that strikes you in your prime, completely debilitates you, and requires more energetic people to spend lots of time caring for you.
On the other hand, on the topic of things that will actually help, there are many organizations [worldbicyclerelief.org] doing many productive things [cooperhewitt.org] to help.
Re:Caffeine (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, most of the beer consumed in England and Europe during the day was what would be considered "small beer". It was only about 2.5% alcohol (enough to kill bacteria, but not enough to cause dehydration like stronger drinks or really to cause much in the way of intoxication). It was safer than the local untreated water and yet not so alcoholic that it would cause any significant imparement.
In addition, in several parts of Europe, beer was almost bread in a bottle. It had a great deal of carbs and a fair amount of protein. That was important because there wasn't always a lot of food and, as a side effect, the composition of the beer basically helped to slow the body's assimilation of the alcohol because it was working to process food at the same time.
Re:A counter example (Score:5, Informative)
Link [wikipedia.org]
Re:"lots of" != all (Score:4, Informative)
The Industrial Revolution's roots are reasonably well known. After a series of a few centuries of upheaval starting with the plagues and ending with the Golden Revolution (which ended the final bouts of disunity and civil unrest that had plagued England since the Civil War), England found itself in possession of an enormous global empire, a upwardly mobile population and attracting some of the brighter minds of Europe. Advances in agriculture saw the country liberated from having to maintain a substantial labor pool, which pretty much assured that the first industrialists had a lot of cheap labor to utilize.
Re:"lots of" != all (Score:3, Informative)
RTFA. Then RTFB when it comes out. A number of experts in the field express reservations about the theory -- especially, the Darwinian elements. But they concede that it is a well-argued and exhaustively documented thesis that answers a question that hasn't been satisfactorily resolved. Which is a surprising sign of progress in the humanities (I note as a humanist). Usually, these kinds of unsettling ideas get greeted with pies in the face.
Re:Caffeine (Score:4, Informative)
It's not that simple (Score:5, Informative)
E.g., earlier they simply needed 90% of the population working in agriculture, so that simply didn't leave enough people to build an industry with. When you realize that the other 10% were the army, clerks, clerics, etc, and a few craftsmen, that was all your population accounted for.
During most of the middle ages, for example, agricultural production was about 2 to 7 grains harvested for every 1 grain planted, which is piss-poor. They had a unit of surface for how much land is needed for a peasant family to subsist on, and support 1/5 of a knight, the "hide". It was 60 to 120 old acres, or 15 to 30 modern acres, or 6 to 12 hectares, depending on fertility. You needed that freaking much land just to feed a family and pay 1/5 of one knight's fee.
(And if you didn't pay that knight, someone else would come who had knights, and take your land and your crops. Getting more craftsmen and less soldiers was just not an option.)
You just couldn't _feed_ a horde of industrial workers earlier. You had a cap on how much population you can feed, and everyone over that limit would just starve. That they died of plagues was just as well, because the alternative was to die of starvation anyway.
Boiling the water wouldn't have solved much, because you'd just have more population to starve instead.
Violence? That was the reason for violence right there too. When people's only choice is to starve or mug someone, they'll mug someone. Well, not always the vulgar robbing one in a dark alley, but also the organized mugging a state by another, a.k.a., warfare. Or raids across the border motivated by just hunger.
You can see what happens when more population survives than you can feed, because that was the Viking invasions. As only the oldest son would inherit the farm, there were a lot of sons kicked on the street with exactly no means of subsistence. And that farm just couldn't feed more than a family, locally or in the city. If not enough people died of disease, that was a lot of population who had to work as mercenaries, guards, or pirates. ("Vikings" was what they called the pirates.)
A lot of people there simply _had_ to raid and loot, because the local economy couldn't support them. It wasn't a fun life. They were dirt-poor desperate people whose whole belongings fit in the small box they sat on when they rowed the longship. They had a choice to die painfully in battle or die slowly of hunger, and they chose the former.
The whole belief in the warlike Aesir gods wasn't as much the cause of violence, but the result of _having_ to be violent to maybe survive a little longer. Damn right you had to believe there's a sense to it all, and that there's some reward awaiting you for that shitty life.
That's really what would have happened if they started being healthier sooner. They'd just have produced more people that the economy can't feed. And they wouldn't have started a great industry, simply because industrial workers need to eat too. If the agriculture doesn't support them, that's it.
That's, of course, one of the factors that armchair historians miss, but it will have to do as an example. The industrial revolution didn't start earlier, simply because a lot of things weren't there to support that kind of a society. You can't go and say, basically, "oh, I know, it's because they didn't boil water" or "oh, I know, it's because they were too bigotted and violent", when other things (e.g., agricultural production) weren't there to support larger urban populations anyway.
Other surrealistic ideas I see thrown around, some even in the summary, include that somehow it took a culture change to get people to work long hours rather than stay poor (they worked long hours earlier too) or that only now they realized they should save money t
Re:Caffeine (Score:5, Informative)
I think you'll find alcohol took care of the sterilization job long before boiling took off in 'western' cultures (it was widespread elsewhere long before). Throughout most of history, beer and wine were much safer to drink than fresh water. Milk is sterile enough straight from the tap but doesn't stay that way, whereas booze does. I think you'd have a much harder time making the 'tea made urbanization possible' argument than the 'beer made civilization possible' argument. Hopefully that puts things into perspective...
Re:i.e. the poor are irrational and lazy (Score:1, Informative)
Re:i.e. the poor are irrational and lazy (Score:3, Informative)
As with everything else, I am sure the reasons for the industrial revolution was far more complex than - "Rich having more kids and people going downwardly mobile".
Re:I didn't say they were useless (Score:3, Informative)
A little out of date now, but this [wikipedia.org] TV series was amazing, and happens to be an excellent example of your point.
Re:It's not that simple (Score:2, Informative)
I'd also like to point out that historically China was not always made up of million-strong cities. The famous 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms' was actually a gruesome time when the whole population decreased by 70% within 60 years. After the Tang Dynasty China was constantly under the assault of northerners, and the Mongols were known for slaughtering Chinese by most common last names. Almost everyone took it for granted that every new government is ushered in with much bloodshed, and this mentality probably reinforces the need for conformity to reduce social violence. Yet despite this, every revolution in Chinese history still started with farmers (including the Communist Revolution,) and hungry farmers invariably resulted from severe flooding of the Yellow River or Yangtze River, or severe drought in the north or west. The uncontrollable weather was truly the emperor's greatest fear, so the most famous religious symbol in Beijing remains the Altar of Heaven - where the emperor prays for good weather for the people.
Hmm, we got some serious flooding and drought in China this year... Maybe Mr. Hu didn't pray hard enough.