Introduction

The technological revolution, set in motion by the invention of modern machinery in the early nineteenth century, gave a tremendous impetus to the process of urbanization. In ancient times, the few towns in existence had served as centres of culture, commerce and administration. In the modern era, industrialization lent a powerful stimulus to their development and expansion. The populations of Europe and America, which in 1800 had been almost entirely of an agrarian and rural character, began to gravitate at an ever-increasing pace towards the new industrial areas. In the United States, for example, in 1790 the population regarded as urban—by definition then—constituted no more than 5·1 per cent of the total. By 1850 this proportion had risen to 15·3 per cent, by 1940 to 56·5 per cent, by 1950 to 59 per cent; by modern criteria, according to which any settlement with more than 2,500 inhabitants is regarded as a town, it constituted no less than 64 per cent of the total. ¹ In 1960 it stood at 88·5 per cent of the population. ²