Science-Based Industry or Industry-Based Science? Electrical Engineering in Germany before World War I

Abstract

Science-Based Industry or Industry-Based Science? Electrical Engineering in Germany before World War I WOLFGANG KCfNIG The complex patterns in which science relates to both technology and industry have long provided grist for the mills of philosophers, sociologists, and historians of technology.1 Philosophers have dis­ cussed the related meanings of discovery and invention and of theory and empiricism. Some argue that technology and industry are becom­ ing more and more scientific. Historical research primarily treats the interrelationships of science, technology, and industry in different time periods. Two recent comprehensive works, both studies of the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain, provide examples: Ian Inkster treats science and technology as a unit, emphasizing the close institu­ tional cooperation between them; in contrast, Akos Paulinyi holds that scientific institutions played no decisive or even important role in technical innovations and industrial development. Paulinyi would argue that inventors and innovators possessed systematic or theoreti­ cal knowledge, but that they often acquired it ad hoc, when they needed information to solve technological problems. Nevertheless, in Dr. Konig is professor of the history of technology at the Technische Universitat Berlin. He is an editor of the journal Technikgeschichte, and one of the authors and editor of the five-volume Propylcien Technikgeschichte. He is currently working on a comparative study of the origins and development of consumer society in the United States and Germany. He thanks the Stifterverband fur die Deutsche Wissenschaft for its support during the writing of this article. 'See, e.g., the evaluations in Technology and Culture quoted byJohn M. Staudenmaier, Technology’s Storytellers: Reweaving the Human Fabric (Cambridge, Mass., 1985), pp. 86103 ; or Walter Kaiser, “Probleme der Wechselwirkung von Wissenschaft und Technik (29. Symposium der Gesellschaft fur Wissenschaftsgeschichte an der RWTH Aachen, 28. bis 30. Mai 1992): Bemerkungen zur Fragestellung und zu den Ergebnissen der Tagung,” Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 16 (1993): 121—28; Peter Lundgreen, ed., Zum Verhaltnis von Wissenschaft und Technik, Erkenntnisziele und Erzeugungsregeln akademischen und technischen Wissens, Vortragstexte einer Tagung (Bielefeld, 1981), pp. 6—31; Friedrich Rapp, Analytische Technikphilosophie (Freiburg, 1978), in particular pp. 102-8.© 1996 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/96/3701-0003$01.00 70 Electrical Engineering in Germany before World War I 71 his reading of the Industrial Revolution, empirical work and voca­ tional experiences dominated scientific approaches.2 It is commonly agreed that in the late 19th century new industries (chemical,3 electrical, optical,4 and refrigeration5) developed with closer connections to science and to scientific institutions. It has be­ come commonplace to call these “science-based industries,” an ex­ pression which has acquired at least four different interpretations in scholarly discourse.6 Thus, science-based industry could mean: (1) the transfer of knowledge by university graduates entering posi2See , e.g., Milton Kerker, “Science and the Steam Engine,” Technology and Culture 2 (1961): 381-90; D. S. L. Cardwell, Technology, Science, and History (London, 1972); A. E. Musson and E. Robinson, eds., Science and Technology in the Industrial Revolution (Manchester, 1969); A. E. Musson, ed., Wissenschaft, Technih und Wirtschaftswachstum im 18. Jahrhundert (Frankfurt am Main, 1977); A. R. Hall, “What Did the Industrial Revo­ lution in Britain Owe to Science?” in Historical Perspectives: Studies in English Thought and Society in Honour ofJ. H. Plumb, ed. Neil McKendrick (London, 1974), pp. 129—51; Ian Inkster, Science and Technology in History: An Approach to Industrial Development (Lon­ don, 1991); Akos Paulinyi, “Die Umwalzung der Technik in der Industriellen Revolu­ tion zwischen 1750 und 1840,” in Propylaen Technikgeschichte, ed. Wolfgang Konig (Ber­ lin, 1991), 3:269-495, esp. 3:455-62. 3See John Joseph Beer, The Emergence ofthe German Dye Industry (Urbana, Ill., 1959); Peter Borscheid, Naturwissenschaft, Stoat und Industrie in Baden (1848—1914) (Stuttgart, 1976); Jonathan Liebenau, Medical Science and Medical Industry: The Formation of the American Pharmaceutical Industry (London, 1987); Georg Meyer-Thurow, “The Industri­ alization of Invention: A Case Study from the German Chemical Industry,” Isis 73 (1982): 363-81; Walter Wetzel, Naturwissenschaften und chemische Industrie in Deutsch­ land: Voraussetzungen undMechanismen ihres Aufstiegs im 19.Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 1991); Ernst Homburg, “The Emergence of Research Laboratories in the Dyestuff Industry, 1870-1900," British Journalfor the History of...