The Industrial Revolution: A Very Short Introduction
by Robert C. Allen · Oxford University Press
Compact overview by a leading economic historian of Britain's industrialisation: its pre-industrial economy, steam, cotton and iron technologies, living standards and winners and losers, and how industrialisation later spread to Europe, America and Asia. Gives a beginner the full arc before the heavier monographs.
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More resources on The Industrial Revolution
Explaining the First Industrial Revolution: Two Views
A 20-page review essay comparing Robert Allen's relative-prices explanation with Joel Mokyr's Industrial Enlightenment explanation of British industrialisation, assessing the evidence for each and where they complement or conflict. Published in the European Review of Economic History (2011). Free, short, and the best map of the Allen-versus-Mokyr debate by the economic historian whose growth estimates frame it. Lets a reader understand the debate before (or instead of) reading both monographs.
Liberty's Dawn: A People's History of the Industrial Revolution
Draws on hundreds of autobiographies written by working men and women between 1760 and 1900 to show how industrialisation changed work, wages, family life, sex, schooling and politics as experienced by those who lived through it. Covers the 'social consequences' strand of the topic, which the economic-history books treat only through aggregates. Primary-source based (working-class memoirs), readable, and a modern alternative to the older pessimist-optimist standard-of-living literature.
The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy
Comparative study arguing that the Yangzi Delta and England were economically similar until about 1800, and that Europe pulled ahead mainly because of accessible coal and New World land and resources rather than deep institutional or cultural advantages. Essential for the 'why Britain/Europe and not China' question.
The Enlightened Economy: An Economic History of Britain 1700-1850
Economic history of Britain from 1700 to 1850 arguing that the Industrial Enlightenment, a culture linking scientists, engineers and artisans and valuing useful knowledge, along with trust-based institutions, explains why sustained innovation took off in Britain. The main counterpoint to Allen: ideas and culture rather than relative prices. Reading Allen and Mokyr together is how the debate is taught.
The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective
Argues that Britain industrialised first because its wages were high and its coal and capital cheap relative to Europe and Asia, making the steam engine, cotton mill and coke smelting uniquely profitable to invent and adopt there. The core statement of the 'induced innovation' explanation that every later debate (Mokyr, Humphries, Kelly-Mokyr-O Grada) responds to. Quantitative with wage and price comparisons.