Industrialisation ( alternatively spelled industrialization) is the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an

agrarian society An agrarian society, or agricultural society, is any community whose economy is based on producing and maintaining crops and farmland. Another way to define an agrarian society is by seeing how much of a nation's total production is in agriculture ...

into an

industrial society In sociology, industrial society is a society driven by the use of technology and machinery to enable mass production, supporting a large population with a high capacity for division of labour. Such a structure developed in the Western world in ...

. This involves an extensive re-organisation of an

economy An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with th ...

for the purpose of

manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to ...

. Historically industrialization is associated with increase of polluting industries heavily dependent on

fossil fuel A fossil fuel is a hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the remains of dead plants and animals that is extracted and burned as a fuel. The main fossil fuels are coal, oil, and natural gas. Fossil fuels ma ...

s. With the increasing focus on

sustainable development Sustainable development is an organizing principle for meeting human development goals while also sustaining the ability of natural systems to provide the natural resources and ecosystem services on which the economy and society depend. The ...

and green industrial policy practices, industrialization increasingly includes technological leapfrogging, with direct investment in more advanced, cleaner technologies. The reorganization of the economy has many unintended consequences both economically and socially. As industrial workers' incomes rise, markets for consumer goods and services of all kinds tend to expand and provide a further stimulus to industrial

investment Investment is the dedication of money to purchase of an asset to attain an increase in value over a period of time. Investment requires a sacrifice of some present asset, such as time, money, or effort. In finance, the purpose of investing is ...

and

economic growth Economic growth can be defined as the increase or improvement in the inflation-adjusted market value of the goods and services produced by an economy in a financial year. Statisticians conventionally measure such growth as the percent rate o ...

. Moreover, family structures tend to shift as extended families tend to no longer live together in one household, location or place.

Background

After the last stage of the Proto-industrialization, the first transformation from an agricultural to an industrial economy is known as the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

and took place from the mid-18th to early 19th century in certain areas in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

and North America, starting in Great Britain, followed by Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, and France. Characteristics of this early industrialisation were technological progress, a shift from rural work to industrial labor, financial investments in new industrial structure, and early developments in class consciousness and theories related to this. Later commentators have called this the First Industrial Revolution. The "

Second Industrial Revolution The Second Industrial Revolution, also known as the Technological Revolution, was a phase of rapid scientific discovery, standardization, mass production and industrialization from the late 19th century into the early 20th century. The ...

" labels the later changes that came about in the mid-19th century after the refinement of the

steam engine A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be ...

, the invention of the

internal combustion engine An internal combustion engine (ICE or IC engine) is a heat engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer (usually air) in a combustion chamber that is an integral part of the working fluid flow circuit. In an internal co ...

, the harnessing of

electricity Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as describe ...

and the construction of canals, railways and electric-power lines. The invention of the

assembly line An assembly line is a manufacturing process (often called a ''progressive assembly'') in which parts (usually interchangeable parts) are added as the semi-finished assembly moves from workstation to workstation where the parts are added in se ...

gave this phase a boost. Coal mines, steelworks, and textile factories replaced homes as the place of work. By the end of the 20th century,

East Asia East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. China, North Korea, South Korea ...

had become one of the most recently industrialised regions of the world. The BRICS states (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are undergoing the process of industrialisation. There is considerable literature on the factors facilitating industrial modernisation and enterprise development.

Industrialisation in East Asia

Between the early 1960s and 1990s, the Four Asian Tigers underwent rapid industrialisation and maintained exceptionally high growth rates.

Social consequences

The

was accompanied with a great deal of changes on the social structure, the main change being a transition from farm work to factory related activities. This resulted in the creation of a class structure that differentiated the commoners from the well off and the working category. It distorted the family system as most people moved into cities and left the farm areas, consequently playing a major role in the transmission of diseases. The place of women in the society then shifted from being home cares to employed workers hence reducing the number of children per household. Furthermore industrialisation contributed to increased cases of child labor and thereafter education systems.

Urbanisation

As the Industrial Revolution was a shift from the agrarian society, people migrated from villages in search of jobs to places where factories were established. This shifting of rural people led to urbanization and increase in the population of towns. The concentration of labour in factories has increased urbanisation and the size of settlements, to serve and house the factory workers.

Exploitation

China

China, along with many other areas of the world run by industrialisation, has been affected by the world's never ending rise of supply and demand. With the largest population in the world, China has become one of the main exporters of household items and appliances.

Changes in family structure

Family structure changes with industrialisation. Sociologist

Talcott Parsons Talcott Parsons (December 13, 1902 – May 8, 1979) was an American sociologist of the classical tradition, best known for his social action theory and structural functionalism. Parsons is considered one of the most influential figures in soci ...

noted that in pre-industrial societies there is an extended family structure spanning many generations who probably remained in the same location for generations. In industrialised societies the

nuclear family A nuclear family, elementary family, cereal-packet family or conjugal family is a family group consisting of parents and their children (one or more), typically living in one home residence. It is in contrast to a single-parent family, the larg ...

, consisting of only parents and their growing children, predominates. Families and children reaching adulthood are more mobile and tend to relocate to where jobs exist. Extended family bonds become more tenuous.

Current situation

the "

international development International development or global development is a broad concept denoting the idea that societies and countries have differing levels of economic or human development on an international scale. It is the basis for international classificatio ...

community" (

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Inte ...

, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), many United Nations departments, FAO WHO

ILO The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is the first and ol ...

and

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...

, endorses development policies like water purification or

primary education Primary education or elementary education is typically the first stage of formal education, coming after preschool/ kindergarten and before secondary school. Primary education takes place in '' primary schools'', ''elementary schools'', or ...

and co-operation amongst third world communities.United Nations

Millennium Development Goals The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were eight international development goals for the year 2015 that had been established following the Millennium Summit of the United Nations in 2000, following the adoption of the United Nations Millenn ...

https://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/ / . Un.org (2008-05-20). Retrieved on 2013-07-29. Some members of the

economic communities This is a list of multilateral free-trade agreements, between several countries all treated equally. For agreements between two countries, between a bloc and a country, or between two blocs, see list of bilateral free-trade agreements; these ar ...

do not consider contemporary industrialisation policies as being adequate to the

global south The concept of Global North and Global South (or North–South divide in a global context) is used to describe a grouping of countries along socio-economic and political characteristics. The Global South is a term often used to identify region ...

(Third World countries) or beneficial in the longer term, with the perception that they may only create inefficient local industries unable to compete in the free-trade dominated political order which industrialisation has fostered.

Environmentalism Environmentalism or environmental rights is a broad Philosophy of life, philosophy, ideology, and social movement regarding concerns for environmental protection and improvement of the health of the environment (biophysical), environment, par ...

and

Green politics Green politics, or ecopolitics, is a political ideology that aims to foster an ecologically sustainable society often, but not always, rooted in environmentalism, nonviolence, social justice and grassroots democracy. Wall 2010. p. 12-13. It be ...

may represent more visceral reactions to industrial growth. Nevertheless, repeated examples in history of apparently successful industrialisation (Britain, Soviet Union, South Korea, China, etc.) may make conventional industrialisation seem like an attractive or even natural path forward, especially as populations grow,

consumerist ''Consumerist'' (also known as ''The Consumerist'') was a non-profit consumer affairs website owned by Consumer Media LLC, a subsidiary of ''Consumer Reports'', with content created by a team of full-time reporters and editors. The site's foc ...

expectations rise and agricultural opportunities diminish. The relationships among economic growth, employment, and poverty reduction are complex. Higher

productivity Productivity is the efficiency of production of goods or services expressed by some measure. Measurements of productivity are often expressed as a ratio of an aggregate output to a single input or an aggregate input used in a production proces ...

, it is argued, may lead to lower

employment Employment is a relationship between two parties regulating the provision of paid labour services. Usually based on a contract, one party, the employer, which might be a corporation, a not-for-profit organization, a co-operative, or any o ...

(see jobless recovery).Claire Melamed, Renate Hartwig and Ursula Grant 2011
Jobs, growth and poverty: what do we know, what don't we know, what should we know?
London:

Overseas Development Institute ODI (formerly the 'Overseas Development Institute') is a global affairs think tank, founded in 1960. Its mission is "to inspire people to act on injustice and inequality through collaborative research and ideas that matter for people and the ...

There are differences across

sector Sector may refer to: Places * Sector, West Virginia, U.S. Geometry * Circular sector, the portion of a disc enclosed by two radii and a circular arc * Hyperbolic sector, a region enclosed by two radii and a hyperbolic arc * Spherical sector, a po ...

s, whereby manufacturing is less able than the tertiary sector to accommodate both increased productivity and employment opportunities; more than 40% of the world's employees are " working poor", whose incomes fail to keep themselves and their families above the $2-a-day

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

. There is also a phenomenon of deindustrialisation, as in the former

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nati ...

countries' transition to market economies, and the

agriculture sector The primary sector of the economy includes any industry involved in the extraction and production of raw materials, such as farming, logging, fishing, forestry and mining. The primary sector tends to make up a larger portion of the economy in de ...

is often the key sector in absorbing the resultant unemployment.