I don't think any singular event can explain the industrial revolution. However, one key aspect (at least in England) was the establishment of stronger personal property laws and the concept of enclosure.

Prior to the industrial revolution the concept of public and private land was rather fluid. Towns were centered on parcels of communal land, which peasants used in order to supplement their income and/or sustain themselves as multiple individuals were able to claim "ownership" over the same parcel of land. This socio-economic resulted in two things: 1. it discouraged the accumulate of capital as no one individual was able to leverage their position to take absolute control and 2. enabled peasants to supplement their income through their own endeavors.

All this changed however as the concept of enclosure spread through the English countryside. Lords and others in positions of power took over the communal lands (which was oftentimes met with violence) in order to use them for their exclusive use. This was enabled through a strengthening of the common law which firmly supported private property rights. Without access to these lands peasants were no longer able to sustain themselves as they were now cut off from a significant portion of their potential income. As a result these individuals were forced into becoming wage laborers.

Taken together, the protection of private property and the creation of a landless or superfluous, class of individuals, provided the conditions necessary for the industrial revolution to flourish; profits were protected and there was the labor available to work in the various factories that were made possible by various technological improvements (ex. steam engine).

Sources: The Agrarian Origins of the Industrial Revolution in England - Larry Patriquin http://rrp.sagepub.com/content/36/2/196.abstract (pay wall sorry)

Custom and Common Right: Waste Land Enclosure and Social Change in West Lancashire - Graham Rogers http://www.bahs.org.uk/AGHR/ARTICLES/41n2a4.pdf