AHC: Industrial revolution starts in New England or France, before Britain?

raharris1973

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Either New England has an industrial revolution before anyplace else in Europe, or France becomes the first place in Europe to have an industrial revolution.
 
If you're a classical liberal, then just have Louis XIII's centralization efforts in France fail, and Charles I's dismissal of Parliament succeed.
 
New England:
ISOT 1750 New England to, say 1500.
around 1700 or so, have a massive calamity strike Europe (in particular Britain and the Low Countries). Maybe a large meteorite hits southern England devastating everything for a thousand miles around...



France: surprisingly tough
Belgium and the Netherlands were both earlier leaders of the Industrial Revolution than France was. You would need an early PoD that a) had France swallow up OTL's Belgium (with its resources) and b) had France be an early leader in e.g. capitalism and shipping.

A lot of the advances in the Industrial Revolution were laid by previous 'pre-IR' industry building, like textiles, capital markets, joint stock companies, etc. Oh. And an agricultural revolution to feed the city folk needed for all of the above. France wasn't a leader, iOTL, in any of those, where the Low Countries and Britain all were.
 
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