The Industrial  Revolution  brought  radical  changes in the 19th century in England and in the western world. The main concept  of the Industrial Revolution is the substitution of competition for the medieval regulations which had in the past  controlled the production and distribution of wealth. Europe owes to Industrial Revolution the growth  of two great systems of thought:   "Economic Science" and "Socialism", that is to say, its  antithesis . Four great economists are worth quoting: Adam Smith, Ricardo, Malthus and Mill. In their studies they   analysed   the Industrial Revolution concept  and its important  consequences . The  main facts of  the Industrial Revolution are the growth of  population and an  agricultural revolution that played a very  important role. There was a decrease in the rural population, caused by the destruction of the popular fields of cultivation, the enclosure on a large scale of common and waste lands and  the consolidation of small farms into large ones   . For  this reason,  there was a period of  great agricultural advance marked by the rotation of crops, the improvement of the breed of cattle, the invention of the steam-plough and the institution of agricultural societies.  People then began to move from the country to the cities, where they had the opportunity to work in factories and then cities  began to grow  leading to urbanization .There was an important growth of industry. In particular,  Industrial  Revolution brought great innovations in  textile industry and there were a lot of mechanical  inventions  such as the spinning-jenny,

 the steam engine ,  the water-frame , the self-acting mule  and an engine for a cotton-mill .The most important inventions of all were  the steam-engine and  the power loom  . Moreover there was a mechanical revolution in iron industry  caused by the invention of smelting by pit-coal and by the application of the steam-engine to blast  furnaces. For the first time there was also an important  development of different  means of communication such as railroad , Road toll  and the canal system. These improved means of communication  caused  an extraordinary increase in commerce. There was  a substitution of factory system for domestic system and this expansion of trade led to the regular recurrence of periods of over-production and of depression. So there was a revolution in the distribution of wealth. Much of  the rise in rents was due to money involved  in improvements, to the fence system, to the consolidation of farms and to the high price of corn during the French war. Moreover there were a lot of social changes in country life. The farmers  shared  in the prosperity of  the landlords. They ceased to work and live with their  labourers  and became a distinct class. There were social changes in manufacturing world: the new class of great capitalist employers made great fortunes, the old relations between masters and men disappeared. Now in the population there was a distinct separation characterized by rich and poor,    a class conflict and the centralization of  wealth  in the hands of a few people. The  misery among  great parts of working people was mainly due to a fall in wages, they suffered from the conditions  of labour  under the factory system, from the rise of prices and from sudden fluctuations of trade. So, the effects of the Industrial Revolution proved that free competition may produce wealth without producing well-being.