CHAPTER INTRODUCTION
The future of the world is today being shaped by industrialization. The remarkable achievements that began in a single nation have not yet been shared equally by all humanity but this may be about to change. Modern industry is largely a phenomenon of countries in the mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere with few peripheral countries as yet members of this rather exclusive club. As the world approaches the twenty-first century much has changed concerning industrialization and the resources that support it. Industry is presently undergoing a global shift which portends a new era for the world as we have come to know it.
When the Bolsheviks took control of the Russian Empire, they found themselves in charge of a vast realm with a mainly agricultural economy. There was nothing in the Soviet Union of the 1920s to rival what was happening in Europe or North America. Soviet communist rulers were determined to change this. They wanted to transform the Soviet economy into an industrial one. The human cost of this gigantic scheme was dreadful, but the desired transformation was accomplished. The Soviet Union became a major industrial power with vast manufacturing complexes.
Outside the Soviet Union, industrial development took a very different course. Market forces, not state planning propelled the Industrial Revolution in Europe and North America, and industrial economies on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean rose to global prominence. Because of the imposition of Soviet ideology and economic planning on Eastern Europe’s industrial development, for more than four decades after World War II, East Europe’s economic geography was constrained. Western Europe’s industrial growth proceeded more freely, and in the postwar period Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea industrialized under free-enterprise rules as well. China, on the other hand, collectivized its agriculture and put its industries under state control.
Major Industrial Regions
Whatever the ideological basis (market-commercial, communist-state, or some combination), the world map of major regional-industrial development reveals that only a small minority of countries have become major industrial economies. Four major industrial regions have developed, all in the Northern Hemisphere:
Western and Central Europe (Figure 25-1), Eastern North America (Figure 25-3), Russia-Ukraine (figure 25-4), and Eastern Asia (Figure 25-5). Each consists of core areas with subsidiary clusters some distance away.
While the older manufacturing regions are quite entrenched, notable shifts are occurring. This dispersal is especially evident in East Asia, where Japan’s dominance is being challenged by the “Four Tigers” of East Asia (see Focus on: ‘The Four Tigers” in Chapter 24). In addition, the entrance of China into the global manufacturing economy in the 1980s is certain to gain in significance in the twenty-first century.
Europe
The location of Europe ’s primary industrial regions still reflects the spatial diffusion of the Industrial Revolution. An axis of manufacturing extends from Britain to Poland and the Czech Republic, and onward to Ukraine. The explanation of this pattern lies in the location of coal fields in Britain and the European continent. Britain’s coal fired industries produced a pattern of functional specialization that, for a time, had no equal in the world, for it was coal that fired the Industrial Revolution.
Europe’s coal deposits lie in a belt across northern France, Belgium, north-central Germany, the northwestern Czech Republic, and southern Poland—and when the Industrial Revolution diffused from Britain onto the mainland it was along this zone that Europe’s major concentrations of heavy industry developed. Europe’s industrial success also depended on the skills of its labor force and the high degree of specialization achieved in various industrial zones.
North America
In North America , industrialization occurred first in the East. Served by a wide array of natural resources and supported by networks of natural as well as artificial transportation systems, remote from the destruction caused by wars in other industrial regions, and on the doorstep of the world’s richest market, North American manufacturing developed rapidly. Today, this complex, anchored by the American Manufacturing Belt—from the northeastern seaboard to Iowa, and from the St. Lawrence Valley to the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers—is the largest in the world (Figure 23-3).
Ukraine and Russia
The most important country detached from the Soviet Empire (after Russia itself) was Ukraine . In the new Europe, Ukraine would be the largest territorial state and one of the most populous. It was a major manufacturing center before the end of the nineteenth century, having been strongly affected by the Industrial Revolution. Coal from its Donetsk Easin (Donbas) and iron ore from the Krivoy Rog reserve and later from Russia’s Kursk Magnetic Anomaly allowed Ukraine to grow into one of the world’s largest manufacturing complexes. Today, despite Ukraine’s political separation from the former Soviet Union (and hence from Russia), Ukrainian and Russian industries are interdependent: Ukraine needs Russian fuels and Russia needs Ukrainian raw materials.
Eastern Asia
Two centuries after the onset of the Industrial Revolution, East Asia is the cauldron of industrialization. From japan to (3uangdong and from South Korea to Singapore, the islands, countries, provinces, and cities fronting the Pacific Ocean are caught up in a frenzy of industrialization that has made the term Pacific Rim synonymous with economic opportunity. Industrial regions in East Asia are the fastest growing in the world. The Asian Pacific Rim, from Japan to Indonesia, includes several of the most rapidly expanding economies, recent setbacks notwithstanding.
CHAPTER QUIZ
MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS
1. Which of the following is p~ a major industrial region
a. Eastern Asia
b. South Asia
c. West Europe
d. Russia
2. One reason London is now considered a key industrial district is:
a. nearby new coal deposits were discovered
b. the government shut down older plants in the Midlands because of pollution
c. the supply of coal ran out in the Midlands
d. coal has decreased in importance
3. Europe’s greatest industrial region is called:
a. the Paris Triangle
b. Saxony
c. Silesia
d. the Rühr
4. The United States is one of the worlds largest ? producers.
a. coal
b. petroleum
c. oil shale
d. hydroelectric
5. Industrial growth in the Upstate New York district started with the:
a. discovery iron ore deposits
b. building of the Erie Canal
c. large ships using Lake Erie
d. invention of electrical appliances
6. The Northwest district from Portland, Oregon to Vancouver. Canada is noted fbr its:
a. agricultural products
b. timber industry
c. aerospace industry
d. optical industry
7. After 1900 Ukraine produced as much as ? percent of all coal mined in the then Soviet Union .
a. 55
b. 70
c. 80
d. 90
8. One of Russia’s oldest and still thriving manufacturing areas is:
a. the Volga
b. Urals
c. St. Petersburg
d. Vladivostok
9. With its Pacific Rim development, China now ranks as the worlds ? largest economy.
a. third
b. second
c. fourth
d. first
10. Japan’s dominant industrial district is the:
a. Kansai
b. Kanto Plain
c. Kitakyushu
d. Toyama
TRUE/FALSE QUESTIONS
1. Manufacturing cities in Britain ’s Midlands are modernizing and are still the dominate industrial region in Britain . (TF)
2. Paris’s relative location was one factor that helped it to become a major industrial center. (TF)
3. New York is one of the world’s major break-of-bulk locations. (TF)
4. The manufacturing region known as the Erie Horseshoe encompasses both the United States and Canada . The international border keeps the countries from being interdependent. (TF)
5. Because of hurricanes, little industrial activity takes place along the Gulf Coast . (TF)
6. Ukraine is divided between a large very productive agrarian region and a Russianized industrial region located in the east. (TF)
7. Russia’s Volga industrial region was originally started when the Russians felt threatened by the Germans before and during World War II. This region has not progressed much since that time because of a lack of available power. (TF)
8. The Pacific Rim of East Asia is a region of varying industrialization depending on the country involved. (TF)
9. Japan has three major industrial areas. (TF)
10. China ’s northeast industrial district is suffering some of the same effects that plague older United States ’ industrial areas. (TF)
STUDY QUESTIONS
1. Referring to figures 25-2 and 25-3 can you find a correlation between the location of fossil fuel and manufacturing regions? Is energy readily availability in the major manufacturing belt? Identify the other manufacturing areas and what they produce. What are maquiladora plants, where are they located, and what do they produce?
2. When you look at Figure 25-1, what do almost all of Europe ’s industrial and urban areas have in common? Read the text. Which regions tie on coal fields? Besides resources, what other factors help to create the industrial regions?
3. Looking at Figure 25-4, what connects all of Russia ’s manufacturing regions? List the regions and their products.
4. Identify manufacturing regions in East Asia and their products using Figure 25-5. Where is the Pacific Rim? What do these regions produce? How are they changing?
