Why did Britain industrialise quickly?

It is undeniable that industrial development occurred on a global scale in the 19^th century. The need for a fuel that was not timber provoked a boom in technological advances in the finding, mining, transportation and exploitation of coal. The geographical factors can be defined in two separate strands. Firstly, the physical topography of the land: namely the quality and division of the land for agriculture, and the natural features which it possesses. This varied dramatically across Europe, from the sandy hills of Italy to the expanse of tundra in Russia. Most crucially, the contents of a country’s natural resources, what lay underneath the topography, was significantly more important than outer geography – at least at the beginning of the century. However, industrial development would not have happened if it had not been for the technology which existed to exploit the natural resources below the surface and to overcome any natural barriers that may have existed. It is the development of steam power which facilitated the mining of deep coal, its speedy and efficient transport and then thrifty use as a factory fuel. Ultimately this is what determined industrial development. How quickly steam power was adopted. it was the adoption of advanced technologies, specifically steam engine power, which determined how industrial development took place. Technological development in this way is the most important determining factor. Because even if you had the natural resources like coal, you still had to find a way of mining it, and then transporting it to be exploited to make goods at a low cost. Geographical elements like hills could be overcome with careful planning and investment by the state. This is most exemplified by the Trans Siberian Railway and the growth of the textile industry in Italy. Technologic advancement can be influenced by the state, and needs some kind of progressive and stable infrastructure to advance in. This is why Japan could industrialise because it had a long history of adopting technology culturally, and why Russia with its de facto feudalism took longer. In order to develop there had to be a compatible capitalist government in which it could flourish. Once the change to capitalism has been made, industrialisation happens quite quickly, as exemplified in Russia in the later 19^th century.