Which had the greatest effect on transforming Europe in the eighteenth century: the agricultural, ...

The three revolutions are interrelated and largely inseparable. The demographic growth of the early eighteenth century increased population dramatically, requiring greater output to support the larger population. Significant changes in agricultural production through new techniques and new technologies increased output significantly, creating surplus and allowing land tenure patterns to shift. This stimulated the Industrial Revolution to meet the growing consumer demand. At first, manufacturing was done in the putting-out system, which therefore employed more households and created surplus income that could be spent on new consumer goods. The population increased, land became less abundant, and urbanization began to shift the population from predominantly rural to more and more city-based workers, and thus participation in a wage economy was critical. With a greater surplus of workers, there was a depression in wages, and therefore there were more workers in the cash economy. Enclosure, an agricultural process, assisted in this transformation. The transition from farming as a means of sustenance to a means of production in response to the demands of a market economy is probably the most dramatic effect of all, but students could just as easily choose and justify the demographic or Industrial Revolution with appropriate analysis.