The industrial revolution, 1760-1830

by Thomas S. Ashton

The Industrial Revolution has sometimes been regarded as a catastrophe which desecrated the English landscape and brought social oppression and appalling physical hardship to the workers. In Ashton's classic account, however, it is presented as an important and beneficial mark of progress. In spite of destructive wars and a rapid growth of population, the material living standards of most of the British people improved, and the technical innovations not only brought economic rewards but also provoked greater intellectual ingenuity. Lucidly argued and authoritative, this book places the phenomenon of the Industrial Revolution in a stimulating perspective.

Genres: History, Economics, Nonfiction, British Literature, 19th Century

144 pages, Hardcover

First published December 31, 1948

About the author

Thomas Southcliffe Ashton (1889–1968) was an English economic historian. He was professor of economic history at the London School of Economics at the University of London from 1944 until 1954, and Emeritus Professor until his death in 1968. His best known work is the 1948 textbook The Industrial Revolution (1760–1830), which put forth a positive view on the benefits of the era.

He donated money to provide the T. S. Ashton Prize, an annual award from the Economic History Society. The prize is currently £750 and is awarded at every other annual conference to the author of the best article accepted for publication in the Economic History Review in the previous two calendar years.

Following a BBC Freedom of Information request in January 2012, it was revealed that Ashton turned down a knighthood in 1957.

Reviews

[Bob Newman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid, no-nonsense book about an important subject

First published in 1948, this book has gone through many editions, the latest, as we can see here, put out in 1998. I recently read the 1964 edition, picked up long ago at a booksale in Melbourne, Australia. Ashton's work is probably timeless. It is a down-to-earth, very well reasoned history of the various historical tendencies and phenomena that together are called "the industrial revolution". I cannot vouch for this volume being absolutely correct. The author does not have much time for those who dwell on the evils of industrialization, or who want to include class struggle in their analysis. Though I was not fully convinced of this, still I was willing to listen. Not being an expert in the field, I was looking for a decent explanation or summary of the whole process. I definitely got my money's worth in Ashton's book. It is well-written, without jargon and without presumption of vast historical knowledge on the part of the reader. It gives you an overview of such various fields as population growth, early forms of industry in England, the technical innovations, capital, banking, labor unions, conditions of workers, industrialists' clubs, and relation of agriculture to industry. Though I found the part about banks and interest rather rough going, it was entirely due to my own poor understanding of the field. My edition could have used a map. The shires, the rivers, and the many towns of England are not all imprinted firmly in the brains of North Americans. Other than that, I would heartily recommend this book to anyone who wants to improve their understanding of the Industrial Revolution.

[bek · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fair warning: this review is written by a tired college student who had to read this book for a class.
Not that bad of a read compared to other books on the same topic. I simultaneously liked and disliked that Ashton didn't assume the reader knew anything about the Industrial Revolution or England in general. Sometimes it was just like "Good Lord, I know what wool is!" but other times I was as uneducated in the topic as assumed. Ashton didn't include any of the negative aspects of the Industrial Revolution which is kind of a relief because it made the book shorter, but also not good because in order to analyze the Industrial Revolution, you have to understand the positive and negative impacts it had/has. The dude also knew how to run-on a sentence. Sometimes you forget where the beginning of the sentence even started and what it was about. Old British English is also not fun to read, but it's not bringing down the rating either (I'm not that much of an uneducated douchebag). It helped to read it out loud in a snotty, British accent if you're also struggling with this. I also felt like Ashton could've organized his thoughts a little better from paragraph to paragraph and made it more clear when he was switching topics.

[Ava]

خیلی وقت بود که این کتاب تو قفسه داشت خاک می خورد. الآن پشیمونم از این همه وقتی که بهش بی محلی کردم.

یه کار تحقیقی- تحلیلی ِ خوب ِ. ترجمه ی خوب و روونی هم داره ازاحمد تدین ( که تا به حال ترجمه ای از ایشون نخونده بودم).

چیزی که از این کتاب یاد گرفته ام نه تاریخ انقلاب صنعتی و نه نوشتن تحقیق و تحلیل ِ. تصور ِ اون همه شور و انگیزه و تلاش و مقابله و... واسم هیجان انگیز بود.
فکر می کنم جنگیدن رو یادم داد. به بقیه ی چیز هاش کاری ندارم.

[Renzo Enrique Gomez Hodwalker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excepcional, un libro inmersivo y detallado sobre los detonantes de la Revolución Industrial, como era la vida, los problemas que enfrentaron y como el Estado lastró en gran parte los beneficios de dicha revolución.

[Occhionelcielo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Altrove c'erano re e regine, cortigiani ed ambasciatori, ministri e generali, e tutti si agitavano per lasciare il proprio segno nella storia.
Qui si cambiava il mondo per sempre.

[Mark Lisac · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not without defects and judgments that prompt skepticism, but a useful review that seeks to correct some stereotypes and provides strong context.
Ashton offers a lot of evidence that the "revolution" was a decades-long affair full of interrelated developments and many different kinds of stops and starts. He highlights, among other things, the importance of factors like prevailing interest rates, the availability of resources and transportation, and the connections between scores of entrepreneurs and inventors. There's also an implicit acknowledgment of constant economic and social flux, no matter what the industrial environment.
He also has a tendency to defend reputations, with varying success, in a time when workers were seen as controllable and to some extent disposable. He occasionally sends a reader scurrying to a dictionary to find the meanings of terms like "corf" and "brattice." He tends to record lists of now-obscure names. And the book has no illustrations to explain any of the new machinery and methods that were developed in the period; the Wikipedia entry on "industrial revolution" may offer a more explanatory account than Ashton's chapter on technological innovations.
The book does provide intriguing glimpses of ways in which many aspects of economy, society and international relations remain similar after more than two centuries (for example, the use of resources for diplomatic leverage, constant shifts between prosperous times and straitened ones, a tendency to form cartels to fix prices and control supply, reliance on government to help people during economic depressions) and other aspects have radically changed (for example, there are no longer laws making it illegal for workers to combine to demand wage increases).
I'm not sure how much Ashton's book may have been superseded since its publication decades ago, but note that it still provokes discussion and criticism.

[Martín Álvarez Rodríguez · Rating 2 out of 5]

Un liberal queriendo vendernos la milonga de que la revolución industrial la crearon emprendedores superhumanos y que lo de las malas condiciones obreras es un cuento de un fantasma imaginario... Libro bastante lamentable.

[Cristián G C · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un clásico del tema que ayuda a desentrañar ese período tan específico y fundamental de la historia.

[Iradj Ipaktchi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eh, first half is interesting but second half is spent justifying capitalism's worst vices.

[AustrianHistorian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maravilloso. La revolución industrial como nunca te la habían contado, salvo que es la versión de uno de los más distinguidos especialistas del siglo pasado.

[Erika Moreno · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poder conocer los orígenes de grandes cambios históricos es algo que debería ser fundamental para todas las personas, es necesario comprender nuestro potencial, necesidades y maneras de efectuar cambios, para entender nuestro pasado y nuestro futuro.

Que estos grandes acontecimientos puedan ser explicados desde sus raíces y de manera sencilla es un gran recurso del autor.

[Jackson Cyril · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ashton dissects the causes and developments of the 'Industrial Revolution' with an almost surgical precision , marshaling to his aid a whole host of facts and concluding that, despite the costs, the Industrial Revolution was a fundamentally good thing-- the progress made justified the hardships suffered. He takes J.B. Bury's declaration that "she [history] is herself simply a science, no less and no more" to heart and therein lies his one fault: the book reads like something Mr. Gradgrind from Dickens' Hard Times would have penned ("facts,facts and nothing but facts!" screams Mr. G throughout the novel). But where is the humanity in the book? Ashton shows little pity for the poor Olivers who labored in horrible conditions, or for the many pathetic paupers whose lives were irrevocably ruined by this march of progress. In treating the Industrial Revolution as a scientific subject, Ashton consciously 'forgets' to mention that which constitutes the lifeblood of history: men and women, boys and girls, the vast majority of whom labor in obscurity, concerning themselves only with the essential matters of survival--procreation, consumption and merry-making. They are absent from this otherwise wonderful account.

[Don Lim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply the phrase "industrial revolution" invokes the image of child labor, harsh working conditions, and extreme pollution. Many wonder why the British subjected themselves to such an environment but it is clear: what was the alternative? Life was even more dreadful farming; it was not the romanticized version we believe today. Without the entire household working, the members would not earn enough to eat, provide clothing, or pay for housing. It is only when the parents could earn enough and the standard of living improved sufficiently that children eventually stopped working. Ashton highlights many of the technological advances that improved working conditions, as well as improving production efficiency. Perhaps the most dreary reminder Ashton gives was how parents oftentimes named multiple children the same name not because they had a fetish for it but because it was expected that parents would outlive their children and at least one should survive to carry the name. The text is easy for a layman and, provided adequate reader's interest, the book should be a short read.

[Plainsboro Public Library · Rating 5 out of 5]

In my opinion, this book was phenomenal. The author, T.S. Ashton, was very skilled at blending his own experiences during the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain with historical facts. There is more to just reading an autobiography; people can learn new information and be aware of the environment and atmosphere during this time in history. While I was reading the book, it felt as if I were living during the Industrial Revolution. The rich vocabulary and description of the Ashton’s experiences made it impossible for me to put the book down. I would strongly urge people to read this book, and to many of the students who are currently studying about the British Industrial Revolution. Pick up the book and give it a try, you will not regret.

Recommended for grades 9 to Adult
- Reviewed by Yash

[Su · Rating 3 out of 5]

Uno de esos libros que la gente lee porque lo solicito un maestro... o porque son maestros, como en mi caso. Es una cronología que sirve de referencia y permite apreciar enormemente a los historiadores capaces de divulgar sus investigaciones de forma atractiva.

[Tonisq · Rating 4 out of 5]

Αρκετά μέτρια η μετάφραση

[Samantha · Rating 1 out of 5]

Terrible en sus esfuerzos de dar <> de la Revolución Industrial, opancado y justificando fallidamente el malo.