AP European History

## Learning Outcomes

- Explain why mechanization made the factory system more effective than the domestic or putting-out system
- Identify the main features of Second Industrial Revolution industry from **c. 1870–1914**
- Compare the First Industrial Revolution with the Second Industrial Revolution
- Understand how factory growth changed work, cities, class relations, and reform politics
- Recall key examples from **Britain**, **Germany**, Belgium, France, and Russia
- Use this topic in AP European History answers focused on causation, change over time, and comparison

## AP European History Syllabus

For the AP European History, you are expected to understand how factories and mechanized production became dominant during the later phase of industrialization, with a focus on the following syllabus points:

- Know that the **Second Industrial Revolution** is usually dated **c. 1870–1914**
- Identify how **mechanization** and the **factory system** replaced or reduced household-based production
- Explain the difference between the **putting-out system** and centralized factory production
- Understand how new sectors such as **steel**, **chemicals**, and **electrical industry** expanded factory dominance
- Compare Britain’s earlier industrial lead with Germany’s later strength in large-scale, science-based industry
- Explain how mechanized factory production increased output but also reduced worker autonomy and intensified class tension
- Know how factory growth contributed to **urbanization**, labor movements, and reform laws
- Distinguish first-wave factory origins from second-wave expansion into mass production and heavy industry

## Test Your Knowledge

_Attempt these questions before reading this article. If you find some difficult or cannot remember the answers, look more closely at that area during your revision._

1. Why did mechanization push production away from homes and into factories?
2. What is the difference between the putting-out system and the factory system?
3. How did the Second Industrial Revolution differ from the earlier industrial phase?
4. Why was **Germany** especially important in late nineteenth-century industrial growth?
5. How did factory dominance affect workers and cities?

## Introduction

Factories did not suddenly appear for the first time in **1870**, but by the late nineteenth century they became the dominant form of industrial production across much of Europe. This matters for AP European History because it connects technology to wider change: industry, class, urban life, politics, and reform. A strong answer does not just say that “machines increased production.” It explains how machines changed where people worked, who controlled labor, and how society was reorganized around industrial capitalism.

The key historical shift was from dispersed labor to centralized labor. Earlier production often took place in homes or small workshops. During the Second Industrial Revolution, production increasingly required expensive machines, power supplies, technical supervision, and coordination among many workers. That combination made factories the most effective way to produce goods on a large scale.

> **Key Term: mechanization**
> The replacement or major reduction of hand labor with machine production.

### Why mechanization made factories dominant

Mechanization did more than make work faster. It changed the whole structure of production. Under the older domestic or putting-out system, merchants supplied raw materials to rural households, and families completed spinning, cloth-making, or other tasks at home. This system worked when tools were small, cheap, and hand-operated.

> **Key Term: putting-out system**
> A system of production in which merchants distributed raw materials to households, where families made goods at home for later collection.

Once production relied on large machinery, this older system became less practical. Machines such as **Richard Arkwright’s water frame** were too large and costly to be placed in scattered cottages. They also needed concentrated power, first from water and later from steam. If an employer had invested a great deal of capital in one machine, it made sense to gather workers in one building, keep the machine running for long hours, and supervise labor closely.

That is why mechanization led directly to the factory system. The point was not only higher output. It was also tighter control. Factory owners could regulate time, pace, discipline, and quality in ways impossible under household production. This helps explain why historians treat mechanization as both a technological and a social change.

> **Key Term: factory system**
> A form of production organized in a central location where employers brought together workers, machines, power, and supervision.

A useful causation chain for the exam is:

- mechanization increased the need for large, costly machines
- large machines worked best in centralized sites
- centralized sites required workers to leave household production
- workers became wage laborers under supervision
- factory labor encouraged urbanization and sharper class divisions

This chain is far stronger than simply saying “machines caused factories.”

The earliest breakthrough came in textiles, but the later nineteenth century expanded this pattern far beyond cloth. During the Second Industrial Revolution, steel, chemicals, and electrical goods also depended on centralized industrial organization. So factory dominance spread from one sector to much of the economy.

> **Test Tip:** In an SAQ or LEQ, do not treat “mechanization” and “factory system” as separate random terms. Link them directly: machine production required centralized production, which increased employer control.

### From first-wave industry to second-wave industry

Students often blur the two industrial revolutions together. AP examiners want a clearer distinction. The earlier phase, especially in **Britain** from the later eighteenth century into the early nineteenth, is associated with **textiles**, **coal**, **steam**, **iron**, and the first expansion of factories. The later phase, **c. 1870–1914**, is associated with **steel**, **chemicals**, **electricity**, **petroleum**, and much larger firms.

The difference is not that factories existed in one period and not the other. Factories already existed earlier. The difference is that the later phase deepened and widened factory production.

One way to compare them:

- First Industrial Revolution: early textile mills, water and steam power, iron, railways, first major break from domestic production
- Second Industrial Revolution: cheap steel, electrical power, chemical manufacturing, larger factories, more standardization, more managerial control

The steel industry shows this shift well. In **1856**, **Henry Bessemer** introduced a cheaper process for making steel, and later **William Siemens** improved production further. Cheap steel allowed for stronger machines, railways, ships, and buildings. This mattered because new industries needed stronger and more durable materials than wood or costly traditional steel could provide.

> **Key Term: Bessemer process**
> A method introduced in 1856 that made steel production faster and cheaper, helping expand heavy industry.

The late nineteenth century also saw the spread of **mass production**, meaning the large-scale manufacture of standardized goods. Standardization mattered because factories increasingly aimed not at one custom-made item but at many identical products for a broader market.

> **Key Term: mass production**
> The large-scale manufacture of standardized goods, usually through machinery, divided labor, and efficient organization.

Factories were helped by the **division of labor**. Instead of one artisan completing an entire object, production was broken into small repeated tasks. This raised output and reduced the need for highly trained craft workers. An employer no longer depended as heavily on artisan independence.

> **Key Term: division of labor**
> The splitting of production into a series of smaller specialized tasks performed by different workers.

This is why mechanization threatened artisans. A skilled craftsperson had once controlled both pace and method. In the factory, the machine and the manager increasingly controlled both.

By the early twentieth century, some industries also moved toward **assembly-line** methods, though students should use this carefully. It best fits the broader trend toward efficiency and standardization rather than all of European industry in Unit 6.

> **Key Term: assembly line**
> A production process in which a product moves through a sequence of tasks performed by workers or machines.

A related development was **scientific management**, also called **Taylorism**, in which managers studied motions and time in order to make labor more efficient. This increased productivity, but it also reduced worker independence by turning many jobs into repetitive tasks.

> **Key Term: scientific management (Taylorism)**
> A system of organizing work for maximum efficiency by measuring tasks and increasing managerial control over labor.

### Country examples: Britain, Germany, and the continent

**Britain** remained the first industrial power and an obvious reference point. Earlier textile mills and steam-powered factories had already established the model. By the later nineteenth century, Britain still had major strength in coal, shipbuilding, and metal industries. It also had the transport system and urban workforce to support further expansion.

But for the Second Industrial Revolution, **Germany** is often the best continental example. After unification in **1871**, Germany developed quickly in **steel**, **chemicals**, and **electrical goods**. This growth was linked to strong banks, research connections, and large-scale business organization. Firms such as **Krupp**, **Siemens**, **BASF**, and **Bayer** reflected modern industrial concentration more clearly than many older British firms.

Germany also helps with business vocabulary. On the continent, industries often used **cartels**, agreements among firms to coordinate prices or output. That is not the same as a trust.

> **Key Term: cartel**
> An association of separate firms that cooperate to control prices or production while remaining formally independent.

Belgium also matters because it industrialized early on the continent, especially in **coal**, **iron**, and **textiles**, with areas such as **Liège** and **Charleroi** showing factory-based heavy industry. France industrialized more slowly, with factory growth in places such as **Lille**, **Alsace**, **Le Creusot**, and **Saint-Étienne**, but older household production remained in place longer. Russia industrialized later still, with factory concentration in textiles around **Moscow** and heavy industry around **St. Petersburg** and the **Donbass**, often with state involvement.

This uneven spread is important. Factories did not erase domestic production overnight. In France and other parts of continental Europe, the old and new systems coexisted for decades.

> **Test Tip:** A strong comparison answer often uses one sentence of qualification: factory dominance spread across Europe unevenly. That shows complexity and avoids an overstatement.

### Effects on labor, cities, and politics

Factory dominance had clear economic benefits. Output rose. Standardized goods became cheaper. Transport and communication improved. Industrial capitalism grew stronger. But AP Euro expects you to pair these gains with social costs.

Factory labor was often repetitive, exhausting, and dangerous. Because tasks were broken down, many workers became more interchangeable. This reduced the bargaining power of artisans and increased the number of wage laborers. Women and children were often employed because employers could pay them less.

In Britain, reform followed public outrage over these conditions. The **Factory Act of 1833** limited child labor in textile mills, and the **Ten Hours Act of 1847** limited the working day for women and young people. These laws came before the full Second Industrial Revolution, but they remained highly relevant because later factory expansion kept labor regulation on the political agenda.

Factories also drove **urbanization**. If the machinery, capital, railways, and power sources were concentrated in one place, then labor had to move there too. This is why industrialization and city growth went together. Workers did not migrate to cities by accident. The structure of mechanized production pulled them there.

Urban growth then produced its own chain of effects:

- crowded housing
- poor sanitation
- disease such as cholera
- visible divisions between owners, managers, and workers
- pressure for public health reform
- growth of unions and socialist politics

Factory dominance therefore links directly to Unit 6 themes of poverty and prosperity, individual and society, and technological innovation.

> **Key Term: urbanization**
> The growth of towns and cities as increasing numbers of people moved from rural areas into urban centers.

The growth of the **industrial working class** also changed politics. Workers organized trade unions, joined Chartism in Britain, and supported socialist and labor movements across Europe. Some resisted machines directly, like the **Luddites**, but over time labor organization became more effective than machine-breaking. This is a classic example of how industrial change produced political responses.

For essays, the best judgment is balanced: factories and mechanization increased productivity and lowered costs, but they also reduced worker autonomy and made social conflict more intense. That balanced approach usually scores better than one-sided celebration or one-sided condemnation.

## Key Point Checklist

_This article has covered the following key knowledge points:_

- The Second Industrial Revolution is usually dated **c. 1870–1914**
- Mechanization replaced or reduced hand labor and made centralized production more efficient
- The putting-out system relied on household labor, while the factory system concentrated labor, machines, and supervision in one site
- Large, costly machines helped make factories dominant because they required power and close management
- Early textile machinery such as **Arkwright’s water frame** helped push production into factories
- The later industrial phase expanded factory production into **steel**, **chemicals**, **electricity**, and related sectors
- The **Bessemer process** made steel cheaper and helped expand heavy industry
- **Mass production** and **division of labor** increased output but reduced artisanal independence
- **Scientific management** increased efficiency while reducing worker autonomy
- Britain remained a key industrial model, but Germany became especially strong in steel, chemicals, and electrical goods after **1871**
- Factory growth contributed to urbanization, class tension, labor movements, and reform laws
- Factory dominance spread unevenly across Europe and did not instantly eliminate older domestic production

## Key Terms and Concepts

- mechanization
- putting-out system
- factory system
- Bessemer process
- mass production
- division of labor
- assembly line
- scientific management (Taylorism)
- cartel
- urbanization


Second Wave Industrialization and Its Effects - Factories and mechanization became dominant