1. The Rise to Economic Supremacy:
Britain became the leading economic and trading power in the world. This devolopment was caused by several factors:
- The Industrial Revolution:
- Britain was the first country in the world which introduced the factory system and mechanizised the manyfactories
- Britain had a lot of natural resources like coal and iron and colonies, from which they got cheap supplies of raw material
- The colonies were also a secure market for British goods
- Britain´s important merchant fleet1
- Britains entrepreneurs were willing to invest capital in technological innovations
- A strong banking and credit system was neccessary
- The textile industries, the coal mining and the iron and steel industries were very important for Britain
- the British industry kept ist leading position although other European countries and the USA had become powerful industrial nations too
1. Economic Decline
After the second World War, Britain has lost its leading postion. This had several economic, political and social causes.
politico-economic reasons:
- loss2 of British capital during the two world wars
- loss of colonial markets
- antagonistic3 economic principles of the alternating4 Labour and Tory governments
- Lack of innovation and modernization, mismanagement and low productivity especially in the traditional industries (coal, iron, steel, textiles)
- Low exports of British-made goods and increasing dependence on foreign- manufactored imports
- Inadequate infrastructure
- Bad relations between the Trade Unions and management · numerous official and unofficial (or so-called ,,wildcat") strikes; there are more than 400 different unions in Britain whic ...