CLEP Western Civilization Test Questions

Answer - C - The Enclosure Acts affected the Industrial Revolution by driving peasants off their land, thus creating a workforce for mines and factories.

Key Takeaway: The Enclosure Acts were a series of acts passed by Parliament that enclosed open fields and common land in the country. This meant that the rights that people once held to graze animals on these previously public areas were denied. The Enclosure Acts forced many country-dwellers to move to urban areas where they would have a better chance at being employed, thus becoming, in the terms of Marxist economics, the proletariat.