This book assesses Britain's handling of city growth during the First Industrial Revolution.

Why is productivity higher in cities? Does urbanization cause growth or does growth cause urbanization? Do countries achieve rapid growth or high incomes without urbanization? How can policy makers reap the benefits of urbanization without paying too high a cost? Does supporting urbanization imply neglecting rural areas? Why do so few governments welcome urbanization? What should governments do to improve housing conditions in cities as they urbanize? Are innovations in housing finance a blessing or a curse for developing countries? How will governments finance the trillions of dollars of infrastructure spending needed for cities in developing countries? First in a series of thematic volumes, this book was prepared for the Commission on Growth and Development to evaluate the state of knowledge of the relationship between urbanization and economic growth. It does not pretend to provide all the answers, but it does identify insights and policy levers to help countries make urbanization work as part of a national growth strategy. It examines a variety of topics: the relevance and policy implications of recent advances in urban economics for developing countries, the role of economic geography in global economic trends and trade patterns, the impacts of urbanization on spatial inequality within countries, and alternative approaches to financing the substantial infrastructure investments required in developing-country cities. Written by prominent academics in their fields, Urbanization and Growth seeks to create a better understanding of the role of urbanization in growth and to inform policy makers tackling the formidable challenges it poses.

The Industrial Revolution remains a defining moment in the economic history of the modern world. But what kind and how much of a revolution was it? And what kind of ?moment? could it have been? These are just some of the larger questions among the many that economic historians continue to debate. Addressing the various interpretations and assumptions that have been attached to the concept of the Industrial Revolution, Joel Mokyr and his four distinguished contributors present and defend their views on essential aspects of the Industrial Revolution. In this revised edition, all chapters?including Mokyr's extensive introductory survey and evaluation of research in this field?are updated to consider arguments and findings advanced since the volume's initial 1993 publication. Like its predecessor, the revised edition of The British Industrial Revolution is an essential book for economic historians and, indeed, for any historian of Great Britain in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

This is an introduction to the Industrial Revolution which offers an integrated account of the economic and social aspects of change during the period. Recent revisionist thinking has implied that fundamental change in economic, social and political life at the time of the Industrial Revolution was minimal or non-existent. The author challenges this interpretation, arguing that the process of revision has gone too far; emphasizing continuity at the expense of change and neglecting many historically unique features of the economy and society. Elements given short shrift in many current interpretations are reassigned their central roles.

This is a coherent and integrated set of essays around the theme of governance addressing a wide range of questions on the organisation and legitimation of authority. At the heart of the book is a set of topics which have long attracted the attention of urbanists and urban historians all over the world: the growth and reform of urban local government, local-centre relationships, public health and pollution, local government finance, the nature of local social élites and of participation in local government. Approaching these topics through the concept of governance not only raises a series of new questions but also extends the scope of enquiry for the historian seeking to understand towns and cities all over the world in a period of rapid change. Questions of governance must be central to a variety of enquiries into the nature of the urban place. There are questions about the setting of agendas, about when a localised or neighbourhood issue becomes a big city or even national political issue, about what makes a ’problem’. Public health and related matters form a central part of the ’issues’ especially for the British; in North America fire and the development of urban real estate have dominated; in India the security of the colonial government had a prominent place. The historical dynamic of these essays follows the change from the chartered governments of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries towards the representative regimes of the nineteenth and twentieth. However, such historical change is not regarded as inevitable, and the effects of bureaucratic growth, regulatory regimes, the legitimating role of rational and scientific knowledge as well as the innovatory use of ritual and space are all dealt with at length.

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