Technology Transfer in Historical Perspective—the 1988 Scandinavian Symposium on the History of Technology/Historical Library of the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm

Abstract

Conference and Library Report TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE—THE 1988 SCANDINAVIAN SYMPOSIUM ON THE HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY/HISTORICAL LIBRARY OF THE ROYAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, STOCKHOLM JANE MORLEY The city of Stavanger was the setting for a symposium entitled Technology Transfer in Historical Perspective, held in mid-June 1988 at the Rogaland Central Technical Institute and sponsored by the Norwegian History of Technology Forum, the Swedish National Committee for History of Technology, and the History of Technology Group of Denmark and Finland. Attended by more than fifty-five participants from the four Scandinavian countries, England, West Germany, and the United States, the symposium took place in conjunction with the Nordisk Teknologiar 1988 conference on re­ gional technological development for civil, petroleum, and biotech­ nology engineers. The symposium opened with a well-attended keynote address by Francis Sejersted, an economic and political historian at the Univer­ sity of Oslo, who examined attitudes concerning the relationship between technology and culture, especially the optimistic and pessi­ mistic attitudes that at different times have influenced Norwegian policymakers. After a plenary talk by Peter Mathias of Cambridge University on the British experience of technology transfer during the first century of industrialization, participants had a choice of two paper sessions to attend, a format followed on the second day as well; on the morning of the final day there was a single session attended by all participants. Ms. Morley is a doctoral candidate in history and sociology of science at the University of Pennsylvania, where she is completing her dissertation, a biography of Frank Bunker Gilbreth. Under the auspices of the Scandinavian-American Foundation, she was a visiting fellow in the Department of History of Technology and Science at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.©1989 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/89/3004—0004301.00 1004 Conference and Library Report 1005 Not surprisingly, most of the papers dealt with the transfer of foreign technology to the Scandinavian countries. For example, Kristine Bruland, recently a postdoctoral fellow at the Business History Unit of the London School of Economics, examined the diffusion of textile technologies between Britain and Norway after the British repeal of the prohibition on textile machinery exports in 1843. On the basis of her close analysis of a variety of primary sources, Bruland found that British suppliers had been active market seekers in Norway, promoting the sale of “packages” of technology not only of hardware but also of expertise and labor.1 Martin Fritz of Goteborg University found that the diffusion of expertise was also important in the Swedish iron and metals industry prior to 1850. The two principal means of technological transfer were English ironworkers and ma­ chinists who set up shops in Sweden and Swedes who traveled to Britain to study production methods and especially to see reverbera­ tory furnaces. Their observations were then published for Swedish ironmasters in technical journals such as the Jernkontorets Annaler. According to Henrik Bjork, a doctoral candidate in the history of technology at Chalmers University of Technology in Goteborg, the role of 19th-century Swedish technicaljournals in the transfer process was important but largely indirect. Although they served to dissemi­ nate information about technologies before they were actually trans­ ferred to Sweden, there was a critical difference between formal information and a functioning technology. These journals were usually read by theoretically oriented members of the “school culture” and not technicians of the “shop culture.” They did prove, however, to be important in the emergence and professionalization of a corps of Swedish engineers. Thus, technicaljournals had an indirect role in the transfer process through the part they played in this profession­ alization; well illustrated, these journals were also important to the development of a new “engineer-specific, pictorial language.”2 The emergence and professionalization of electrical engineers in Finland were primary factors in the electrification of the country and in the development of its electrical industry. In his study of the transfer of electrical technology to Finland between 1870 and 1930, Timo Myllyntaus, professor of economic and social history at Helsinki University, found that the most important of seven different channels in the transfer process were engineering students...