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The Great divergence is the socio-economic shift in the western world which made them overcome the pre-modern growth constraints and Emerge during the 19th century as the most powerful civilization.
It also emerged to be the wealthiest civilization. There is no single proven reason why this thing happened and why at this time only when the eastern civilization like the Mughal empire in India, Qing empire in China, and Joseon kingdom in Korea were at their peak.
Many theories have been proposed to explain why the Great divergence happened.
It is also believed that the main point of the start of the divergence was somewhere in the 16 century but the major change happened in the 19th century and that is why this is the time which is called the Great divergence.
Possible Reasons:
1) Coal:
In the 19th century the railroads were being developed, new factories were being set up and coal was starting to get used instead of wood and charcoal.
In the western world for example in Britain, coal can be found in abundance and it is also concentrated on a small island rather than the vast land of China.
The major difference here was that in china coal mines were at a different place than where it was used in maximum capacity. This acted as an advantage for the western world.
2) Innovation:
The East had been experimenting and innovating things for many decades, but they have stopped that and just started to live on with what they have discovered till then.
On the other hand, the West was continuously trying to innovate things and was never stopping to experiment. Because of this their technological efficiency increased which became a reason for the Great divergence.
3) Colonialism:
Many scholars suggest that colonialism is one of the major reasons for the divergence in the 19th century.
Colonialism has played a major role in the deindustrialization of countries in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Many historians have also blamed the British rule in India for the deindustrializing of the textile industries.
Until the 19th century, India was the leading cotton textile manufacturer but with the East India Company coming into India and setting up its strategies, there grew a huge difference between the western world and India.
But this economic downfall was also because of the decline of the prosperous Mughal Empire.
4) Globalization:
A study in 2017 found that Globalization was the major driver of the economic divergence in rich and poor nations of the world in the years 1850-1900. Mostly the western countries were benefited because of strong constraints on executive power.
5) Chance:
Several scholars have also suggested that the great divergence can be just a good hand at luck and nothing else. All the things that happened and at the time it happened can be just a part of luck.
Effects:
1) Increase in per capita income:
Industrialization was a part of the Great divergence. An increase in per capita income is the most important evidence of the divergence.
When the west developed railroads and steamboats in the 19th century, is attributed to a large part of the increase in their per capita income.
2) Increase in productivity:
Total Factor Productivity (TFP) is applied to quantify differences in productivity between countries. In the 19th century, the TFP of the western world was higher than that of the eastern world which shows they were more productive. Also, they were more efficient than the others.
3) Fuel and Resources:
In the mid-19th century, the use of coal was increased due to the decrease in the amount of wood that was demanded globally. European lands do not have a lot of forests which means they have a very limited supply of wood so they had to move forward towards forest conservation and use coal as an alternative.
On the other side china and India still didn’t quite start the use of coal that much which gave a head-start to the European Countries.
The debate on Divergence is quite broad but here we can see the main things which caused and affected the great divergence.
This is seen as a turning point in the modern world in the field of economy as well as science. The Great divergence peaked during the early 20th century and continued until the 1970s when the great convergence replaced it.
Written by: Bhavish Doshi
Edited by: Gourav Chowdhury
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