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The intellectual and socio-economic context of the development of the discipline of sociology as well as of the modern city has been framed by the dual revolutions, namely:
In this lecture we shall discuss what the Industrial Revolution entailed and the irreversible changes brought about by it. We shall also look at the French Revolution and the new ideology of governance that it ushered in. The rise of the new social world is encapsulated in the concepts of gemeinschaft and gesellschaft. While the first captures the lost world of small communities, the second concept refers to the one that was ushered as a result of the twin revolutions.
Before the term ‘Industrial Revolution’ was popularized by the economic historian Arnold Toynbee (1852-83), the phenomenon was known as the ‘English System’. The changes brought about by the Industrail Revolution (IR) overturned not only traditional economies, but also whole societies. Economic changes caused far-fetched social changes, including the movement of people to cities, the availability of a greater variety of material goods, and new ways of doing business. But what was the Industrial Revolution?
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