Originally posted by clivex@May 14 2008, 08:49 AM
So you are saying that the massive loss of life, the inability to feed their own populations, was a price worth paying?
Most rapid industrialisations in history have involved a significant loss of life.
South Korea?
Japan?
Arguably Germany too?
The USA?
I'm not saying they were a price worth paying (well arguably it might have been in the case of the Soviet Union, more of which later) but rather given the speed under which they were accomplished, and the low base they came from, there was a degree of inevitability about it. There's possibly an aspect of climate to consider too.
The Soviet Union is an excellent example in fairness, had they not been able to build up their industrial infrastructure in the very short period of time that they did, there has to be a very really chance that Germany would have been able to push through to the oil fields and the outcome of WWII might have been very different (not least for us). A few battles such as Stalingrad, or the unsuccessful sieges of Leningrad and Moscow are often invoked as turning points, and not without good reason. In truth though, of equal significance was the ability of the Soviet's command economy to respond at the time of great national peril and in the space of 4 - 6 weeks they were able to dismantle their factories and move them thousands of miles East of the Urals and have them back in production again in about 2 months. That 20, T34 tanks were rolling off the production line for every single Tiger that Germany could produce was clearly decisive at Kursk. The Germans were destroying 3, T34's for every Panzer they lost, but just couldn't replenish at the same rate. Now could you imagine Britain doing something like that? My God we can't even sort out things like foot and mouth disease in the same period, yet alone relocate 90% of our major industry.
Some of the second generation industrial revolutions did occur to me when I made the original posting. As you say, Germany is the debatable one, not least of all because the country didn't exist prior to 1871, which makes attributing the first generation very difficult.
The French certainly experienced similar conditions to ourselves, as we started industrialising about a century earlier. There isn't that much available by way of official record, and it's even harder to work out in Germany's case which was a confederation of Prussian states. In many respects historians find themselves frequently reduced to using contemporary accounts of travelling writers or authors. There can be little doubt that someone like Hugo paints a grim picture of the Parisian scene at the time of the first wave, and later on Zola (Germinal) would do the same for Alsace-Lorraine.
I got there eventually, as the latter is relevant since Germany inheritted it in the Franco/ Prussian war, and it was the base for their first (sometimes called 'the second industrial revolution'). In time they would expand into the coalfields of the Rhur valley and set up heavy plants in the Rhine and Saar. I seem to think the Silesian coalfields were probably under German occupation at the time too, and it's pretty well documented that illness was rife and living conditions were nearly every bit as horrible, certainly in Alsace-Lorraine, and the Rhur (though not as bad as the late 18th and early 19th century).
Perhaps the critical factor here, concerns the existance of the 'second industrial revolutions', (the USA is frequently cited in this bracket too). It's arguable as to whether there were two distinct ages, or whether it involved a seemless evolution in line with technological advances, that allowed countries to join in at the second stage, and effectively pass through the first stage, as a result of having been able to learn lessons from the pioneer industrialist, or their greater willingness to embrace new technologies, and make these the cornerstones of their programmes. I for one wouldn't like to say for certain.
The theory is largely understandable though, in that the more rudimentary processes involved in smelting iron ore, the age of steam and the rapid expansion of cities created all the ingredients that we associate with the 'hard times' that the industrial revolution brought. These technologies became obsolete however, despite ourselves and the French continuing with them long after Germany and America were exploiting and investing in new industrial drivers. To some extent they were able to learn from the first revolution, and ultimately things like electricity (America) and chemical engineering (Germany) came to be drivers that under-wrote their countries industrialisation. I'd accept, as I hinted at in the original post, that these were less damaging, and for want of a crude way of putting it, 'cleaner' industrial processes that didn't bring with them the polluted cities and attendant health implications. It's also possible that we need to acknowledge the introduction of public health acts and advances in medicene, as the ruling classes slowly came to realise that cholera didn't respect social class, and that a physically unfit and sick work-force wasn't capable of being sent out to fight wars to defend the capitalist interests of industrial giants. I think it's fair to say Germany went through some grim times, not least the bits they annexed from the French.
The USA is a very difficult one, and I'm not really that knowledgable on their industrial revolution. They might have got lucky in a way, in so far as they started with a clean piece of paper, and a land rich in raw materials and space. They also brought a degree of know how across from Europe too. Perhaps the biggest stroke of good fortune they had though was something to do with technological coincidence, in that the benefits and applications for oil, and it's potential to under-write an industrialisation programme, just happened to start being exploited at exactly the same time as huge resevoirs of the stuff were discovered in Texas, and Oklahomo etc. I think the extraction of traditional raw materials though was every bit as grim. Whether it be mining companies, or individual stake claimers, the pioneer frontier towns of California, (gold) or Pennsylvania (coal) involved a pretty grim existance.
Japan has always intrigued me, and it was they who I had in mind when I said "most rapid industrialisations in history". I've spent a bit of time there as a guest of their government, and although I found some answers, I left with just as many questions, and there's certainly a few bits they're quite happy to hush up. In the first case they have a very rigid hierarchical society in which everyone has their alloted place, which is allied to an unswerving sense of common focus working to a common objective. In that respect it's an incredibly obidient and disciplined society, and in mnay respects their early industrial gains (1919 - 1938) were much more akin with that of a command economy, as they shared many of the same characteristics.
For just about their entire history, they remained remote and completely isolated to outside influences though. In the 1890's this started to change. They occupied Hokkido, and formed an alliance with Britain taking on board some of our ideas. They remained poor however in terms of natural resources (90% of the country is mountainous and largely inaccessible), and their cities were always prone to being flattened by earthquakes (10% of the worlds earthquakes occur in Japan I was assured). Strategically though, they started to emerge as a target for Russian interests. The name of the naval battle escapes me, but they gained an unexpected and decisive rout of the Russian navy, and a well documented rapid period of industrialisation started, and to no small extent this was achieved through a command structure. It was largely manufacturing and engineering based though, rather than the 'grim' industrial type described earlier (as they had little by way of natural resources). By the 1930's they had successfully invaded large parts of China and Manchuria, and it was largely the prisoners they took who were the victims of Japans rapid industrialisation. In a couple of years between 1930 and 1936 giants like Mazda, Nissan, Toyota, Fugi and Matsushita appeared. I think Mitsubishi were making planes and had started a bit earlier. Japanese capitalism was certainly not averse to transferring the toil and sacrifice to immigrant or forced labour though, and they've largely wiped from history the suffering of these people in laying the foundations. Even today, migrant workers and 2nd and 3rd generations of survivors are accorded an inferior status. It's only recently that the 'peace garden' in Hiroshima (home of Mazda I seem to recall?) has been permitted a monument to the dead Koreans who perished in the A Bomb working as forced labour.
It's their second revolution that I find so interesting, and wouldn't under-estimate the amount of foreign aid they received to stop them falling into turmoil, terminal destabalisation and eventually becoming a target for communism though. Leaving that aside, they weren't the only country to receive aid, yet their advances were nothing short of remarkable and is probably encapsulated in the year 1964, which saw them host the Olympics, run the first bullet trains, and join the OECD. Japanese households were encouraged to own the "three sacred treasures"; a washing machine, a television and a fridge. (Just as an aside, one of their dutiful civil servants informed they modelled their railway network on ours!!! I politely asked him if there was any chance we could have it back).
Their industrialisation was indeed spectacular. From being a ruin in 1945, most of the houses in Tokyo were still built of wood; well strictly speaking that's not true as the Tokyo fire bombing raids had removed these (more killed in these raids then Hiroshima I believe)) and Sony employed about 50 people. Yet within 40 years they've got the all powerful America under severe trade pressures, and long ago overtook all the European economies. They told me that the GDP for Tokyo alone was higher than Canada's.
Their success is the one that really is remarkable, though I wouldn't under-estimate the role that a strict and regimented command structure has played in it. The other thing that sets it apart is that it was perhaps much more a revolution of process, rather than product. That is to say, it wasn't so much what the country was producing, but rather how they were producing it, that was revolutionary and giving them a competitive edge (even if the theory was American originally, and largely ignored in preference to Taylorism). The final thing to consider is what I can only describe as a prodigious work rate, which is both focused and industrious (not to be confused with merely attending the workplace), the hours they worked were frightening and not a little disconcerting as I can't believe it made for a terribly healthy balance in society. It also seemed to be driven with a tacit sense of nationalism and duty, in which everyone had prescribed roles and were required to perform them as a matter of honour.
In many respects the Japanese seem to have embraced bits and pieces from all influences and combined them into a very unique cocktail. Their big corporations perform a role not too far removed from the concept of a paternal commune. They promote more egalitarian working practices that encourages contributions and inter action, yet simulataneosuly have a very vigorous command structure that isn't open to questioning, once an instruction is issued. The issue of sacrifice and suffering however, was largely transferred to foreign nationals in the first instance, and not surprisingly it isn't easy to find too many references to it.
