Source: John Bowring, British diplomat and economist, *Report on the Commercial Statistics of Syria*, presented to both Houses of Parliament, 1840.
"The manufacturing policy of the Pasha [Muhammad Ali] is a state monopoly. He has attempted to build cotton mills, foundries, and arms factories by commanding the labor of his subjects and prohibiting the import of foreign goods that compete with his establishments. Yet, this system is struggling to compete with European manufactures. The high cost of importing fuel, the resistance of the agricultural population forced into factory work, and the Anglo-Turkish Treaty of 1838, which outlaws monopolies across the Ottoman Empire, threaten to dismantle his entire economic structure."
Which of the following best explains a major difference between the industrialization process in Egypt described in the passage and the industrialization process in Great Britain during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries?
- British industrialization was driven primarily by private entrepreneurs and capital accumulation, whereas Egyptian industrialization was initiated and controlled by the state to strengthen its military and political autonomy.Answer
- BBritish industrialization relied on mercantilist state monopolies that banned all foreign trade, whereas Egypt attempted to transition immediately to a free-market capitalist system.
- CEgypt utilized electricity and chemical engineering to leapfrog Western technology, while Great Britain's early factories were limited to coal and steam power.
- DThe British government directly annexed Egypt as a formal colony to establish administrative control over its cotton fields, whereas British industrial development was entirely free from foreign diplomatic intervention.