Revolution Delayed ->Different 1800's

?What if there was no Industrial Revolution in the 1700's?. I don't think whe can completely do away with it, But maybe delay it by a couple generations.

Power looms are smaller and remain Water powered, Watts steam engine in 1780~1790, 1st Railroads in the 1860's, Telegraph in the 1890's, Telephone in the 1930's,1st HVA in the 1960's, ETC.

?What would happen Politically and Culturally?
No Railways or telegraphs to tie the expanding US together and feed the sense of Manifest Destiny.
No Railways or telegraphs to tie the Princely States of India to the British Raj.
No Railways or telegraphs to Allow the Cape British to outmaneuver the Boers.
No trans-Siberian to move Russian Troops and settlers west to take the Siberian Coast.
No steam engine to move the Industrial Heart from New England to the Great Lakes and the Pennsylvania coal fields.
No Bessmer process to turn out tons of Steel for Railroads and Ironclads

?So What happens to the 19th Century? ?Does the US win the ACW? ?Do Italy and Germany Unite? ?Do Whe just postpone the Great War till the early 21st Century.
 
Thought this would be a interesting one:) Nobody have any thing to say:confused:

DuQuense

Would depend on the circumstances, in terms of the cause and how much things were delayed. A poorer, more Euro-centric world with less/slower communications and much poorer transportation as you say. With less and later railways and steamships much less movement of population and resources. Generally smaller states. Possibly more warfare in 19thC Europe as reduced emigration prospects means more conflict over territory.

On your points:
No Railways or telegraphs to tie the expanding US together and feed the sense of Manifest Destiny.
- quite possibly. May see western [i.e. trans Appalatian] independence movements.

No Railways or telegraphs to tie the Princely States of India to the British Raj.
- Would reduce the British edge but they would still have superior resources overall and probably better communications. Also you could see Indian [+ possibly other] national identities significantly less advanced.

No Railways or telegraphs to Allow the Cape British to outmaneuver the Boers.
- Depends on what time-period. By the 1880+ presumably they would start being in place in S Africa.

No trans-Siberian to move Russian Troops and settlers west to take the Siberian Coast.
- Might prevent or make more difficult the seizure of the Amur provinces from China in 1860?

No steam engine to move the Industrial Heart from New England to the Great Lakes and the Pennsylvania coal fields.
- Don't know. If you get a canal linking the lakes to new York say they they could provide a very effective link between the region and the wider world. Area would still be delayed in development due to less/later settlement. Could also see more heated rivarly between Britain and US over control of the Lakes if their vital for transport into the interior.

No Bessmer process to turn out tons of Steel for Railroads and Ironclads
- It would come but later. Might not be in Britain if developments varied. Britain should have an edge in a less industrised world with a small, rich high density homeland with good communications and keeping control of the sea but other powers have more time to catch up.

Does the US win the ACW?
- Quite possibly not. Far more difficult to project power overland. Also a less settled and developed north due to less immigrants.

Do Italy and Germany Unite? - presuming the French revolution isn't butterflied then the nationalist cat is out of the bag. However possibly slower with poorer communications meaning stronger local identities and more difficult to organise and assemble great armies also means smaller states have greater endurance. [Also without industrialisation and mass production probably education and spread of ideas is reduced, lack of books, pamplets etc and means to distribute them].

Do Whe just postpone the Great War till the early 21st Century - Probably more like late 20thC, although quite possibly one or two big Napoleonic type conflicts before then.

Steve
 
It seems to me that Europe could end up stagnating, like China, in such a situation. Productivity won't keep pace with population growth, creating a thoroughly Malthusian society.

Hmm.
 

Typo

Banned
Without the industrial revolution there won't be an ACW, since one of the essential reasons was the south felt distanced from the industrializing north
 
. . .
No Railways or telegraphs to tie the expanding US together and feed the sense of Manifest Destiny.
. . .
No steam engine to move the Industrial Heart from New England to the Great Lakes and the Pennsylvania coal fields.

Robert Fogel was a Nobel Prize winning economist who wrote Railroads and American Economic Growth. It is classic counterfactual which says that the USA didn't have to have the railroads to prosper. Canals would have done the same job just as economically.
fogel-image2.gif
 
Robert Fogel was a Nobel Prize winning economist who wrote Railroads and American Economic Growth. It is classic counterfactual which says that the USA didn't have to have the railroads to prosper. Canals would have done the same job just as economically.
fogel-image2.gif

Canals can be very efficient. In energy terms even more than railways, although somewhat slower. However they are much more difficult and expensive to build, especially when it comes to crossing watersheds. It would be very difficult to build a network in the east to match what the railways did OTL, especially with labour being rarer. Not to mention can you see a trans-continental canal!:eek:

Steve
 
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