The Industrial Revolution is an extremely interesting section of America's history, because, like anything we've studied it seems, it has multiple causes. Some would suggest that Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin popularized the notion of a "repeatable task" in the world of manufacturing. Others would say that America was just mimicking the success of European Industry. Nonetheless, the entire structure of our economy was changed.
At this time, the central government of the United States is powerful, but surely not as powerful as the Federalists had hoped. Like we talked about in class, this gave the government little power to intervene when it came to investors (capitalists) spending money on labor and capital. So the rich get richer--but they get richer faster than any other time in American history preceding the Industrial Revolution.
At this point, America's economy is growing rapidly. While generally a very good thing, but the millions of factory workers are being exploited, seen as gears rather than people. What comes out of this is the emergence of unions, who still remain major political powers today. But before these unions are popular and fully developed, a great many Americans are feeling alienated and insignificant. A new class division has begun.
So I guess the question is, in a democracy, is it necessary to sacrifice the individual for the whole? Does the individual lose his/her voice in the sea of other alienated, frustrated laborers? Will these workers unite and overturn the government?
While many are suffering, some good things do happen. The Romanticism movement becomes popular in America (carrying over the Atlantic from the European Industrial Revolution), particularly the works of Irving and Poe that emphasize the importance of emotion and intuition against the "ration" or "reason" of science and industry. Also, the laborers find their voice in unions.
However, it's going to get a lot worse before it's going to get better.
Friday, July 6, 2007
The Shift to Industrialization
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4 comments:
The question in relation to democracy "Should the individual be sacraficed for the whole" is complex. I would say that in reference to unions, no the individual should not be replaced by the whole. I think that unions orginally had a great purpose, but have now been replaced by groupthink that is steered by interest groups and is replacing individual thought. My grandfather retired from GM after 35 years and was in a autoworkers union. When I asked him why he voted the way he did in 04' he replied "I voted along union affliation." He did not know the individual policies of the person he voted for, just what the union told him. I don't think that the original founders of unions would have wanted this type of blind followership in modern times.
People look at factory workers being taken advantage of during the industrial revolution is as an action of the times when in fact it is not. The same thing is still going on today with the only change being that America has shifted to a service based economy.
As always, nice video.
In the context of your democracy question: what if one person "pursuing their happiness/equal opportunity" is at the expense of another person?
is that John Stuart Mill, or you, Tai? Sorry. Really cheesy.
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