Industrialization of France

The industrialization of France in the 19th century was slower than that of Great Britain and Germany , although the French Empire under Napoleon was the leading economic power in Europe at the beginning of the 19th century .

Stages of industrialization

Proto-industrialization

In France, by the mercantilism in Regime Ancien the proto-industrialization with distribution of the publishing system already progressed far, especially in the areas around Amiens and Rouen , as well as in Brittany and Champagne , where big centers of the linen industry existed.

Early industrializations

The invention and spread of the steam engine and its use in mining , in the textile industry , in the railways and in shipping ( steamship ) drove industrial development in England in the second half of the 18th century (" Industrial Revolution "). Numerous raw materials came to the United Kingdom from the lucrative colonies .

In France, however, after the turmoil of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, the risk-taking necessary to invest in a business or new technology instead of real estate was less pronounced than elsewhere.

The shielding of the domestic market from Great Britain brought about by the Napoleonic continental blockade was essentially retained by the strictly protectionist tariff and tariff policy of the Restoration period. However, this policy did not bring the desired economic and innovation boost; In the absence of competition, there were few incentives to modernize the manufacturing industry and industrial plants. Heavy industry developed and became competitive within the framework of mercantilist politics . The high tariffs, on the other hand, harmed light industry .

Superior English technologies gradually made their way into France through a combination of technology transfer and industrial espionage in the early 19th century . The English mechanic William Cockerill, senior, introduced a Watt steam engine into French-occupied Belgium in 1813 , which was used as a model for replicas. This happened despite all British attempts to keep the technical innovations in their own country. In Great Britain, the unlicensed export of machines was prohibited ( export control ).

France, which had been using the steam engine since 1781 - even if only in small numbers - benefited from this technology transfer. The cotton mill after the "general [n] introduction of the mule - jennys " was the most modern industrial sector of the country. Overall, this progressive mechanization of key industries (especially the textile industry ) created the basis for extensive industrialization.

The take-off phase

The rather sluggish development picked up speed in the period from 1830 to 1860, with a rapid increase in industrial production. However, economic growth in France continued to lag behind that in other European countries. During this time, Germany managed to accelerate industrialization throughout the country. However, it did not succeed in significantly reducing the gap with Great Britain.

Although machines and technical innovations were introduced in all industrial areas and production was increasingly concentrated and based on division of labor, modern industry did not completely replace the old forms of production in all areas. In 1850 , hemp was still spun exclusively by hand, and machine-driven flax spinning only made up ten percent of the national flax processing.

The Bourbons were finally overthrown by the February Revolution of 1848 . Louis Napoléon became president of the Second Republic . In 1852 he made himself Emperor Napoleon III. ( Second Empire 1852–70). He pursued prestige politics and acquired further colonies in North and Central Africa, Madagascar and Indochina.

After Napoléon III. Since its coup d'état on December 2, 1851, France no longer had to have international economic agreements ratified by parliament, France began in 1860 to conclude most-favored-nation agreements with friendly nations and important trading partners (these were also extended to Germany in 1881). All in all, this led to a cautious opening of the French internal market.

In 1855 the first world exhibition took place in France . It was modeled on the London Great Exhibition of 1851 and should exceed this if possible. There were other world exhibitions also in Paris in 1867 , 1878 , 1889 ( Eiffel Tower ), 1900 (and only then again in 1937 ).

Consolidation phase

From 1860 to the outbreak of the First World War , the French economy consolidated, although in the 1870s France had to pay off its war debts and high reparations to the German Empire after the Franco-Prussian War .

Napoleon III was captured after the Battle of Sedan in 1870; After the defeat in the Franco-Prussian War (1870/71) he was deposed and made way for the Third Republic .

As a result, there was even less capital available for investment, which also caused economic growth to slow down at the same time.

On the other hand, the construction of railway lines reduced the transport time and the transport costs considerably and thus contributed to increased productivity, which made France internationally competitive in selected areas. This was also evident in the government's customs and tax policy, which gradually dismantled the previously very restrictive mercantilist regulations in some selected industrial sectors, if a certain industry could also compete with those in Great Britain and the German Reich. Nevertheless, France did not manage to catch up with the two nations mentioned above in the macroeconomically immensely important area of steel production , even though it had increased its steel output faster than any other European country by 1913. On the eve of the First World War, France's industry was largely consolidated, but far inferior to that of the German Empire, at least in the areas of the steel industry and mining.

Industrial sectors and mining

Mining

France's greatest industrial location disadvantage is the scarcity of coal. The French coal was also unsuitable for making coke . The lack of high quality coal increased the cost of iron and steel production enormously as this coal had to be imported from Great Britain and Germany at high prices. The shortage of coal, which on the one hand can be attributed to the natural conditions, but also to the loss of territory, mainly due to the independence of Belgium in 1830 and the cession of Alsace-Lorraine in 1871, weighed heavily on France. The metal ore either had to be transported to the coal regions, or the coal had to be transported to regions with ore mining, where, as in the Loire basin, a large part of French heavy industry was established. Both caused high transport costs. An improvement only gradually emerged with the construction of the railway network, as the transport capacity that could be reached by rail was higher than that by road or navigable canals. Therefore, the construction of the railway goes back to the mining industry. The first line from Saint-Étienne to Andrézieux was set up to transport coal from the mine to the nearby canals.

Metal processing industry

The metal processing industry is closely networked with the mining industry due to the smelting production process and the ore and coal required for the smelting process. The problems of mining therefore also hindered the metalworking industry, which could only be partially offset by innovations in smelting technology.

Caused by France's abundance of forests on the one hand and the scarcity of mineral coal on the other, the charcoal blast furnace was used for a very long time and for smelting metal , so that iron production by coke blast furnaces made up only 50 percent of total production in 1850. The establishment of large heavy industrial centers took more time than was the case, for example, in the German Empire, partly because of the charcoal smelters that were scattered around the forests. Overall, the metalworking industry was initially not internationally competitive despite large factories such as Le Creusot and Schneider . As a result, a protectionist customs policy was necessary in order to protect the domestic metal industry's internal sales market. With a grown and strengthened industry, France benefited during the reign of Napoleon III. again from a reduction in tariffs.

Textile industry

The textile industry in France made up less than one percent of the total capital of all economic enterprises, but measured against the large number of workers it was one of the most important industries.

The French textile industry was largely non-industrialized until 1850. Only the cotton industry made significant progress in the first 50 years of the nineteenth century, especially after the widespread introduction of the fine spinning machine . The fine spinning machine took a long time from its first introduction in 1782 to its nationwide use. This sluggishness in spreading technical innovations was not limited to the textile industry. Rather, it was a typical feature of the French economy, which had also used the steam engine very early on and had known the coke oven since 1785.

The technical innovations for processing raw cotton were known early on and the organization of production in the factory system was largely completed by 1830. The cotton processing industry was the 'engine' of the growth and emergence of other industries, creating a huge demand for looms and machines and employing a large number of workers.

In the other textile processing branches, with the exception of textile printing, technical and organizational innovations took off only slowly in the first half of the nineteenth century. After 1850, many French textile companies expanded, which forced the artisans in the textile sector - the rural weavers and spinners - to accept low wages or to stop production altogether. From 1880 onwards, the growth of the French consumer goods-oriented textile industry slowed down again, even if the hemp, wool, jute and linen processing industries were now increasingly technical. This - in contrast to the other flourishing industries - can be explained by the atypical slowdown in growth with France's pronounced single market orientation on the one hand and a reduction in the standard of living of the population on the other hand, who were no longer able to spend as much money as before on textile products . The simultaneous slowdown in population growth reinforced the less rapidly growing demand for textiles.

The textile industry also benefited from advances and technical innovations in the chemical sector. They needed the bleaching, finishing and coloring agents produced by chemical plants , which made the technology of textile printing possible in the first place. Another major breakthrough for the printing of fabrics came from the discovery of the artificial, comparatively inexpensive production of ultramarine , which served as a blue dye. This discovery made colorful, especially blue, fabric cheaper and more affordable for the broader population.

Chemical industry

After the process of making sodium bicarbonate from salt and the manufacturing processes for sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid had already been discovered and made industrially useful in the German Empire , these products could be used in industry.

The yield of agriculture could also be increased by the progress in the field of chemistry. The extraction of sugar from the sugar beet through the use of bone charcoal, lime and carbonic acid was a way of alleviating the sugar shortage after the loss of many overseas possessions and of compensating for it later.

Transport policy

Since transport costs make up a large proportion of production costs and the associated international competitiveness of industries, all French governments have always tried to improve the transport infrastructure.

Road construction

The road infrastructure in France was largely superior to that of the British due to the still existing and in some cases still further developed old Roman traffic route network . However, many of the old roads were in a desolate condition, which is why all governments in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries tried to repair and expand the network of roads and paths. During the French Revolution and the time of the German Empire, however, this effort was not crowned with success due to the necessary war effort, so that in 1815 the state road network was in an extremely poor condition. After investments in repairs and expansion, the general network with its main traffic axes was expanded to include smaller departmental roads from 1830. After further improvements, France had a total road network of around 100,000 kilometers by 1848.

The road network in the north-east was best developed with its heavy industry, the long border line, the proximity to the capital and the excellent natural conditions for road construction. The lower transport costs due to this good infrastructure contributed to the further growth and international competitiveness of the Loire region.

Sewer construction

Despite the excellent road network by international standards, it was no longer sufficient to cost-effectively transport the steadily growing industrial demand for raw materials and fuels. Initially, only waterways could meet the needs of industry. At the same time as the roads were improved, the construction of the canals was therefore tackled. About two thirds of the canals in France were built between 1814 and 1848. However, the 7000 km long waterway network of France was inadequate compared to that of Great Britain and the German states and hindered keeping pace in industrial development with these economic areas.

Railway construction

In 1827 a 21 km long horse-drawn tram was opened between Saint-Étienne and Andrézieux in the Massif Central . It was built according to the English model in standard gauge and served as a discharge route for coal mines. In 1830 two steam locomotives built by Marc Seguin were used for the first time , but they only supplemented the horse business. In 1832 the line was extended to Lyon and was already double-tracked on this section. The first exclusively steam-powered railway line in France was the Paris - Saint-Germain-en-Laye line, opened in 1837 .

After the first railroad was built with royal privilege in 1823, Parliament secured the sole rights to issue building permits. The French route network was mostly created through cooperation between the state and private capital, since the latter alone did not prove to be sufficient for expanding the network. The forms of state support were manifold: cash grants in money or land (up to 1884 in a total amount of more than 1½ billion francs ), state purchase of shares as well as interest guarantee grants as a result of a law of June 11, 1859 for six large railway companies , each of which was assigned a large region to build a network. Including the subsidies for the Algerian railways until 1883, the total amount of these subsidies reached 700 million francs. Only two of these companies, the Nordostbahn and the Paris-Lyon-Marseille line, worked so successfully that they did not have to make use of the interest rate guarantee. In addition, there was the benefit of mergers, long concessions and the mild application of state supervision law. The state also took care of the maintenance of some unprofitable lines.

As a result of these mechanisms, the establishment of a nationwide railway network ultimately took place more slowly than in other European countries, so that in 1850 France lagged behind Great Britain and the German states in the field of railway construction and, at 3000 kilometers, had only half as long a rail network as the German states at the same time. The total length of the French railway network at the beginning of 1885 was over 30,000 km.

population

In France, unlike Great Britain, urbanization took place slowly . While in 1851 74.5 percent of the people lived in the country, 60 years later it was still 55.8 percent. The shift in the proportion of the population from rural to urban is not only due to internal mobility , but to the significantly higher birth rate in the cities. The number of people who actually moved from the countryside to the city was lower than the above figures suggest. This phenomenon can in part be explained by the persistence of rural proto-industrial trades and the success of the publishing system that existed in parts of France well into the twentieth century. This protected many people from rapid impoverishment and gave the population about two generations to adjust to the new conditions in an industrialized country. There was also poverty in France; However, it never reached dimensions as in parts of the peasantry in Great Britain or among the weavers in Silesia. Seen in this light, France's slower industrialization and the consequent lack of real industrial revolution did not necessarily have a negative impact on the lives of the population. Even if wages fell in the course of industrialization, which can be seen, for example, in the slower growth of the consumer goods-oriented textile industry, large sections of the population did not become impoverished.

literature

Fernand Braudel , Ernest Labrousse (ed.): Economy and society in France in the age of industrialization. 1789-1880. 2 volumes. Syndikat et al., Frankfurt am Main 1986–1988, ISBN 3-8108-0242-5 (vol. 1), ISBN 3-610-00734-6 (vol. 2).
Carlo M. Cipolla (Ed.): European Economic History. Volume 4: The Development of Industrial Societies. Fischer, Stuttgart et al. 1977, ISBN 3-437-40032-0 .
John H. Clapham : The economic Development of France and Germany. 1815-1914 . 4th edition, reprint. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1961.
Leslie A. Clarkson: Proto-industrialization. The first phase of industrialization? Macmillan, Houndmills et al. 1985, ISBN 0-333-34392-1 .
Yves Cohen, Klaus Manfrass (Ed.): France and Germany. Research, technology and industrial development in the 19th and 20th centuries. International colloquium, organized by the German Historical Institute Paris in conjunction with the Deutsches Museum Munich and the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie, Paris, Munich, 12. – 15. October 1987. Beck, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-406-35092-5 .
Wolfram Fischer (ed.): European economic and social history from the middle of the 19th century to the First World War (= manual of European economic and social history. 5). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1985, ISBN 3-12-904770-0 .
Douglas Fisher: The industrial revolution. A macroeconomic interpretation. St. Martin's Press, New York NY 1992, ISBN 0-312-07989-3 .
Helmut Großkreutz: Private Capital and Canal Construction in France 1814–1848. A case study on the role of banks in French industrialization (= writings on economic and social history. 28). Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1977, ISBN 3-428-03852-5 (also: Berlin, Free University, dissertation, 1974).
John R. Harris: Industrial Espionage and Technology Transfer. Britain and France in the Eighteenth Century. Ashgate, Aldershot et al. 1998, ISBN 0-85967-827-X .
Jonathan Hughes: Industrialization and Economic History. Theses and Conjectures. McGraw-Hill, New York NY 1970.
Tom Kemp: Industrialization in Nineteenth Century Europe. Longman, London et al. 1969, ISBN 0-582-48025-6 .
Ilja Mieck : (Ed.): European economic and social history from the middle of the 17th century to the middle of the 19th century (= handbook of European economic and social history. 4). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-12-904760-3 .
Toni Pierenkemper : Controversial Revolutions. Industrialization in the 19th century (= Fischer pocket books. 60147). Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1996, ISBN 3-596-60147-9 .
Sidney Pollard : Peaceful Conquest. The Industrialization of Europe 1760-1970. Oxford University Press, Oxford et al. 1981, ISBN 0-19-877093-6 .
Sidney Pollard (ed.): Region and industrialization. Studies on the role of the region in the economic history of the last two centuries (= critical studies on historical science . 42). Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Göttingen 1980, ISBN 3-525-35998-5 .
Didier Terrier: Les deux ages de la proto-industrie. Les tisserands du Cambrésis et du Saint-Quentinois, 1730–1880 (= Recherches d'histoire et de sciences sociales. 64). Éditions de l'Ecole des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris 1996, ISBN 2-7132-1203-0 .
Patrick Verley : The industrial revolution. 1760-1870 (= Le monde de ... 14). MA Éditions, Paris 1985, ISBN 2-86676-194-4 .