So what is an industrial society?

What is an industrial society? Often we come across a similar concept. And not only in scientific rhetoric, but also in everyday communication. In order to fully understand what an industrial society is, we need to turn to sociology and political science. After all, it was in the midst of these sciences that this concept first appeared and later found its completed forms and nuances.

So, what is an industrial society?

According to classical and modern sociologists, it arose with the industrial revolution of modern times and replaced feudal society with its natural economy and vassal relations. The term itself was introduced into scientific circulation in the beginning of the XIX century by the Frenchman KA Saint-Simon. For him, it was embodied, to a large extent, in the development of industry and technocracy. A significant contribution to the development of the question of what an industrial society is, the classical Western sociologists Auguste Comte, Emil Durkheim and others also contributed to the evolution of this concept. It was usually described by a number of characteristic features in all spheres of human life activity.

Economy

Thus, for the economies of such societies, the industrial, mechanized mode of production is characteristic ; The dominance of large monopolies (both private and public); Intensive development of financial capital; Increase in the efficiency of all social production. Thanks to the development of productive forces and means of communication, a truly global world market is finally forming, social production is divided into three sectors (agrarian, industrial, service sector), and there are periodic overproduction crises.

Social traits

A peculiar transitional feature from the economy to social life is the stratification of society and the emergence of classes of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Actually, it is the struggle of these classes that determines in many respects the values of the industrial society and the ways of its development.

Politic system

In this respect, industrial societies are characterized by the inability of archaic forms such as monarchies. With the growth of productive forces and industrial potential, as well as the emergence of the working class and the bourgeois class, civil values also emerged. In place of yesterday's empires, national states were formed. However, the industrial society of the 20th century demonstrated that it can exist far not only in conditions of capitalism and developed democratic institutions. Since industrial societies can rightly be called societies that existed in totalitarian socialist and fascist states.

Cultural sphere

In this regard, industrial society is characterized by a large-scale rationalization of minds, a significant decrease in the authority of the church and other religious institutions, the development of natural science, the formation of mass education, the emergence and formation of science, the media and so on.