Upon Pillars of Coal: Industry and Societal Development in Late 19 Century Central Europe

Aleksandra Dul, University of Cambridge

This paper attempts to analyse the complex interrelations between individual and collective wellbeing in an era of rapid industrialisation. Research for England has shown that improvements in standard of living for the majority of population during the Industrial Revolution were modest, and that economic growth often came at the price of individual wellbeing. This paper will look at a trans-national region in Central Europe characterised by dominant and ever-expanding heavy industry, where the interplay of political and cultural factors resulted in varying socioeconomic potential within a cluster of geographically adjacent territories. Research of the Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social Structure has shown that the occupational shift from primary to secondary sector had already been complete at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and the striking feature of 19th century British economy was the growth of tertiary sector. Combining data on occupational structure with trends in labour productivity will show how, by contrast, Central Europe experienced labour-promoting, and not labour-replacing industrialization. The paper will therefore test how Allen’s high factor price hypothesis applies to continental Europe. Combining data on wages and industrial machinery allows to approach productivity from two different perspectives: technology and human capital. Observed trends are tested against data on ethnic and religious composition, education and demographic structure. This approach helps better our understanding of the complex relationship between economic growth and standard of living. The proposed modelling makes it possible to trace changes across the region through a consistent and scalable metric of development.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 64. Cities and Industrialization