The Industrial Revolution hardly fits the parameters that define a traditional revolution. Usually, when we think of revolutions, we think of war, riot, political upheaval, and chaos---lots of chaos. Because of this, the classical example of a revolution is the American Revolution, which features all of these qualities. However, the Industrial Revolution is not marked by war, nor fundamental political change; instead, the Industrial Revolution is distinguished by a massive, unprecedented social change. Incidentally, how did the Industrial Revolution fundamentally influence society? Specifically: did the social class "hierarchy" change?
Like the Enlightenment, or the present Information Revolution, the Industrial Revolution profoundly impacted how people lived. In England, the population skyrocketed from 9 million in 1780 to 21 million in 1851 (McKay, 725), the economic focus shifted from agriculture to factories, and most importantly, society redefined it's classes and roles. The latter of these changes is perhaps the most interesting, because of how technological advances so profoundly influenced social changes, and because of how differently the separate classes were affected. Although social classes were all impacted by the Industrial Revolution, the most progress can be seen in the middle class, while little to negative progress can be seen in the lower class; therefore, the Industrial Revolution actually widened the gap between the middle and lower classes, instead of benefitting all classes.
Clearly, the most impacted class during the Industrial Revolution was the middle class, which previously consisted of merchants and professional people. Thanks to a new economic system, "Laissez-Faire", which emphasized little government interference in terms of businesses, the somewhat wealthy and certainly comfortable middle class was able to evolve into factory owners. Not only did middle class families possess enough money in order to enter business, but also, many of them had rich networks of people that they could contact. Therefore, "Laissez-Faire" opened many windows of opportunity for people who had enough money to start up businesses because it provided the already wealthy with the freedom to use creativity in order to maximize profit. (It is important to note at this time that the previous 'noble class' remained relatively unchanged, and was still as proportionately rich as before).
Because of the new attitudes towards factories, and the combined technological advancements and high demand for product, the middle class families became incredibly wealthy. This increased wealth allowed middle class children to receive a formal education, which was expensive for the time (McKay, 734). However, a formal education was something that a lower class child could only dream of receiving. Obviously, this is because of the high cost; but also, lower class families did not earn enough money in order to advance themselves (for example, to potentially ascend the ranks and achieve a middle class status), and therefore they were never able to find a means to afford a formal education. This ultimately resulted in economical stagnation within the lower class, which saw evolution (the lower class transformed from farmers into factory workers), but little economic advancement. Because of this stagnation, the lower class watched as early capitalism (laissez-faire) led to competition among businesses, which in turn led to further progress and more wealth for the middle class. In the end, the rich became richer, and while the poor certainly did not become poorer, they did not become as proportionately wealthy as the middle class. Because of all of these factors, the economic gap, and therefore the social gap, between the middle and lower class widened during the Industrial Revolution.
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