Engineering In Spain Research Articles

Editorial: Maritime engineering in Spain

Editorial: Maritime engineering in Spain

Nuclear Power for Catalonia: The Role of the Official Chamber of Industry of Barcelona, 1953–1962

Between 1939 and 1959, the regime led by General Franco pursued a policy of economic self-sufficiency. This policy inflicted great injury on Spanish science and industry, not least in Catalonia, and in its capital, Barcelona. In response, Catalan industry looked to a future made more promising by the advent of nuclear power. This paper describes the innovative role of an industrial body, the Official Chamber of Industry of Barcelona, in catalyzing one the first programmes of teaching and research in nuclear engineering in Spain.

Modernity and Hybridity: Nature, Regeneracionismo, and the Production of the Spanish Waterscape, 1890–1930

Spain is arguably the European country where the water crisis has become most acute in recent years. The political and ecological importance of water is not, however, only a recent development in Spain. Throughout this century, water politics, economics, culture, and engineering have infused and embodied the myriad tensions and conflicts that drove and still drive Spanish society. And although the significance of water on the Iberian peninsula has attracted considerable scholarly and other attention, the central role of water politics, water culture, and water engineering in shaping Spanish society on the one hand, and the contemporary water geography and ecology of Spain as the product of centuries of socioecological interaction on the other, have remained largely unexplored. The hybrid character of the water landscape, or “waterscape,” comes to the fore in Spain in a clear and unambiguous manner. The socionatural production of Spanish society can be illustrated by excavating the central role of water politics and engineering in Spain's modernization process. In the first part of the paper, I develop a theoretical and methodological perspective that is explicitly critical of traditional approaches in water-resources studies, which tend to separate various aspects of the hydrological cycle into discrete and independent objects of study. My perspective, broadly situated within the political ecology tradition, draws critically from recent work by ecological historians, cultural critics, sociologists of science, critical social theorists, and political economists. My main objective is to bring together what has been severed for too long by insisting that nature and society are deeply intertwined. In the second part of the paper, I excavate the origins of Spain's early-twentieth-century modernization process (1890–1930) as expressed in debates and actions around the hydrological condition. The conceptual framework presented in the first part helps structure a narrative that weaves water through the network of socionatural relations in ways that permit the recasting of modernity as a deeply geographical, although by no means coherent, homogeneous, total, or uncontested project. In sum, I seek to document how the socionatural is historically produced to generate a particular, but inherently dynamic, geographical configuration.

Public perception of biotechnology and genetic engineering in Spain: Tendencies and ambivalence

The authors analyze available data concerning the public perception of biotechnology and genetic engineering in Spain. The data show a series of ambivalent attitudes in Spanish public opinion towards these modern technologies. Although research in human genetic engineering is considered to be valuable, its application is questioned from an ethical perspective. Biotechnology is believed to be useful to humanity, yet Spaniards are not in favor of its application to food production. Another aspect of aspect of Spanish public opinion is the poor knowledge of the technologies at issue. The authors argue that this situation is caused primarily by the lack of debate in Spanish society concerning the social, legal, ethical, and economic implications of biotechnology and genetic engineering. The absence of public debate on technology in a particular society is a reflection and a cause of that society's failure to engage in the processes of conflict, negotiation, and regulation that lead to the configuration of the technology.

Mathematics and Computers for Teaching Engineering

SUMMARY This paper reflects on the present situation of mathematics teaching for engineers in Spain and the future needs of engineers in this field. One of the parts that will increase in importance is probably Numerical Analysis, obviously for computer users. The most important characteristics for teaching this are described, with reference, in particular, to Engineering students, the motivation for learning, and the importance of practical developments