ABSTRACT
Industrialization has become a world process, no longer confined to a privileged group of leading countries. It embodies the technology and organization which have transformed production methods and ways of living at a staggering rate in the twentieth century. Consideration of European industrialization in a world perspective suggests that it was the outcome of a series of changes going back to the Middle Ages; cause and result of a dynamic lacking in other parts of the world. The British model of industrialization issued from an well-developed market economy. As industrialization moved into a higher gear the old British model became outdated, and it was in Germany and most of all in the United States that the new model took shape. The nations which are rich and powerful possess a technologically advanced industrial base, capable of turning out a large volume of manufactured goods. Nations which are poor and dependent have little or no industry and are primarily agricultural.
