The result has been de-industrialisation on a major scale, and the loss of hundreds of thousands of formal sector jobs in countries where industrialisation had been in its infancy.
Harvard economist Dani Rodrik argues that industrialisation has been steadily losing its economic development magic.
Both Mr Rodrik and our column take the view that industrialisation has been and remains a key to catch-up development.
The linear economy the world has been hooked on since industrialisation began – making, selling and throwing away stuff – has reached a breaking point.
But in many poor parts of the world, in Africa in particular, there has been rapid urbanisation without industrialisation or economic growth or job creation.
Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, directly raised this sensitive issue earlier this week when he said: "The climate change phenomenon has been caused by the industrialisation of the developed world.
The idea that generations of Britons grew up on a home-harvested diet of cow's milk, grain foods and feast meats before promptly forgetting all about their heritage at the moment of industrialisation has been scotched by several decades of investigation.
Moreover, the absence of objects of industrialisation has been defined as forming conformity with poverty.
This profile of Narayanganj reveals that, despite its good business environment and being a top destination for foreign and local investment, industrialisation has been both a boon and a bane.
They say the new affluent workers and emergent service workers appear to be the children of the "traditional working class," which they say has been fragmented by de-industrialisation, mass unemployment, immigration and the restructuring of urban space.
