From Coal to Code: What the Industrial Past Can Teach Us About the AI Future

The Industrial Revolution marked a turning point for humanity, the moment we began organizing society around machines, speed, and production. What started as an innovation in coal and steam soon became a philosophy that progress could be engineered, and power could be mined.

In 18th-century England, coal wasn’t just energy. It was ambition. It fueled glassmaking, brewing, and salt production, and its steam engines pulled water from mines and trains across the countryside. Half of England’s coal never left its borders that’s how deeply it powered daily life. For the first time, human progress had a fuel source, and Britain knew how to use it. Compared to the Chinese government, the British state took a more direct interest in coal drafting laws to promote its extraction, transport, and use, ensuring London’s ever-growing hunger for energy was always met.

But Britain’s industrial success came with consequences and colonies. Before English mills turned, India was the world’s textile capital. Its cottons, chintzes, and muslins were traded across continents, woven by artisans whose skill defined luxury. The subcontinent’s textile traditions weren’t merely an economic system they were a cultural identity, sustained through generations of craftsmanship and pride.

As Britain industrialized, that artistry became collateral. Colonial policies turned India into a supplier of raw cotton and a captive market for British goods. Heavy tariffs kept Indian textiles out of Britain, while British fabric flowed freely into India. Raw cotton was exported at low cost, spun and woven in Lancashire using slave-grown fiber from the American South, and then resold to India at marked-up prices.

What came back was not art, but imitation factory-made cloth that was faster, cheaper, and infinitely repeatable. The looms of Bengal fell silent, replaced by the rhythm of machines thousands of miles away. The deindustrialization of India wasn’t an accident of progress; it was a policy of control. Britain’s machines ran on coal, but its system ran on domination over resources, markets, and minds.

This transformation changed more than just economics. It reshaped the very idea of consumption. When handwoven cloth gave way to factory-spun textiles, scarcity was replaced by abundance, and quality by quantity. The idea that things could and should, be replaced quickly began here. It’s no coincidence that the culture of fast consumption, the constant churn of production and replacement, was born from the same forces that dismantled artisanal economies.

The economics behind this shift were simple but devastating. Britain’s ability to control both the source of raw materials and the sale of finished goods created an artificial monopoly one that extracted wealth from its colonies while fueling its own prosperity. That wealth financed new industries, infrastructure, and technologies, laying the groundwork for modern capitalism. But it also revealed a dangerous truth: progress for some often depends on the exploitation of others.

Centuries later, echoes of that system are resurfacing. The recent wave of tariff wars especially under U.S. President Donald Trump reflects a new form of protectionism reminiscent of Britain’s colonial playbook. By imposing tariffs on steel, aluminum, and Chinese technology, the U.S. sought to shield its industries from global competition. Yet such measures also risk reshaping trade relationships and supply chains, creating new winners and new losers in the global economy.

Only this time, the resource isn’t coal, it’s data. The race isn’t for textiles or territory, but for algorithms, semiconductors, and artificial intelligence. Nations are now competing to secure chips, restrict exports, and control who gets access to the new raw material of the 21st century: information.

The parallels are striking. Then, Britain used its colonial laws to dominate trade; now, tech powers use digital policy and economic sanctions to do the same. The vocabulary has evolved from “civilizing missions” to “national security measures” but the logic hasn’t. It’s still about who controls production, who profits, and who pays the price.

The Industrial Revolution taught us how to produce more. The AI revolution might teach us how to think more or, if we’re not careful, how to repeat the same mistakes in a new form. Every technological leap carries a story of displacement: what we gain in efficiency, we often lose in equity, art, or meaning.

History may not repeat itself perfectly, but it rhymes. Britain’s rise came at the cost of India’s craftsmanship. Today, as nations wage digital and economic wars in the name of progress, the world faces a familiar question: will innovation expand opportunity, or deepen inequality? Because whether powered by coal or by code, every revolution carries within it the same thread

Who gets to create, and who gets consumed?