THE CHIEF FEATURES OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION

“The Chief Features of the Industrial Revolution”  is an argumentative text written by Arnold Toynbee in which there are the most relevant aspects connected to the Industrial Revolution.

The text is developed into eleven paragraphs each having a definitive function.  

The first paragraph has got an introductory function and it is an account of Industrial Revolution.                                                                                                                                                                          

The second paragraph is organized into three argumentations: first of all it informs the reader about what is the Industrial Revolution (it is the substitution of mediaeval regulation of production and distribution of wealth), then what is its importance (spread two systems of thought: Economic Science and Socialism) and finally who were the chief landmarks of that period (Smith, Malthus, Ricardo, Mill).                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

The next paragraph assesses the first fact of the Industrial Revolution: the growth of the population. To support his thesis the writer  mentions some examples of statistics in percent (so quantitative data).                                                                                                                        

Then, in the fourth paragraph, is explained the second fact of the Industrial Revolution: the agrarian revolution. It is organized into a question and an answer that is divided in three explanations. The question is ” What were the agricultural changes which led to this noticeable decrease in the rural population?”. The first answer is “the destruction of the common field system of cultivation”; the second is “the enclosure of common and waste lands”; and the third is the consolidation of small farms into large”.                                                                                                                                 

The fifth paragraph has got a quality function and it’s about the positive results of Agrarian Revolution: the enclosure system, the substitution of large for small farm, the conversion of arable to pasture and the introduction of rotation of crops.                                                                                                                                                            

The next three paragraphs (that gives quality data) are about the growth of industry and they are divided into arguments: the first is about the mechanical inventions in textile industry (were invented the spinning-jenny, the water frame, the self-acting mule, the cotton mill and the power loom); the second is about the mechanical revolution in iron industry (the invention of smelting by pit-coal and the application of the steam-engine to blast furnaces); the third paragraph is about the revolution of communication (the canal system was being developed through the country and, above all, was invented the railroad).                                                                                                                                   

The ninth paragraph explains, with quantitative data,  that there was a revolution in distribution of  wealth too, in fact in agriculture there was an enormous rise in rents due to money invested in improvements, to the enclosure system, to the consolidation of farms and to the high price of corn.                                                                                                                 

All these changes brought social changes in manufacturing world ( paragraph number ten, that has  got a comparative function, in fact it contrasts the previous positive results with negative consequences due to the Industrial Revolution), in fact the new class of capitalist employers made a huge fortune, it took thousands of workers and consequently, being in many,the relations between masters and men disappeared. This new situation caused the misery of working people because they suffered from the conditions of labour under the factory system and from the rise of prices.                                                                                                                                                                                                             

The last paragraph is the conclusion in which the writer the writer makes explicit his thesis: the effects of the Industrial Revolution may have produced wealth without necessarily producing well-being.