ABSTRACT
T HE economic opportunities which presented themselves tothe British people in the late nineteenth century changedconsiderably as a result of changes of which some originated chiefly from non-economic causes and of which many were outside British control. Not only were the opportunities different, but partly because of that very difference and partly because of changes in the structure and aspirations of British society, the ease with which economic activity could be adapted to make the most of them was also affected, in some ways for the better, in others for the worse. Among the influences which gave British economic activity a new setting, three were specially important. These were the acceleration and broadening scope of technological change; the expansive surge of industrialization in several large foreign countries and the commercial development of vast primary producing lands overseas for the first time; and the gradual modification of the wasteful demographic situation at home which had been one of the chief conditioning factors of economic life from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
