Dynamics of Innovation: The Expansion of Technology in Modern Times

BEST KNOWN AS THE LEADING HISTORIAN OF FRENCH RAILWAYS, François Caron has also conducted significant research on other aspects of economic development in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, such as electricity, water and steam power, the theory of innovation, and the structure of enterprise. In this volume, he brings together different facets of his expertise to present a broad panorama of modern technological history. Caron shows how artisanal know-how was adapted, expanded, and formalized during the three industrial revolutions that swept over Great Britain, France, Germany, and the United States, resulting in a comprehensive analysis of this long, complex, and continuous historical process, leading up to the twenty-first century. He thereby illustrates the increasingly fruitful interaction between technological and scientific knowledge in modern times.

Table of Contents:
Translator’s Preface Introduction PART ONE Chapter 1. The Artisanal Mode of Knowledge Industrial Framework: The World of Trades Artisanal Knowledge and the Arc of Experience The Interaction of Trades Circulation of Knowledge Chapter 2. From Artisan to Expert The Appropriation of Artisanal Knowledge The Role of Writing Knowledge of Experts Chapter 3. Formalized Knowledge The Professional Engineer The Industrial Enterprise Science and Utility: The Other Revolution Practice and Theory Chapter 4. Technological Adventures The Production of Energy The Mechanization of Industry Birth of the Mechanical Industry The Chemical Industry PART TWO Chapter 5. Industrial Logic and the Dynamics of Knowledge Entrepreneurs and Enterprises Artisanal Trades and the Formalization of Knowledge Engineers and Engineering Three Examples of Engineering Science Science, the Universities, and the State Chapter 6. Steam Engines Domination of Empirical Knowledge Before 1850 The Birth of Thermodynamics Experimental Thermodynamics The Conquest of Great Efficiency The End of an Era Chapter 7. The Chemical Industry Organic Chemistry and the Dye Industry before 1900 Physical Chemistry and the Second Industrial Revolution Macromolecular Chemistry and Vertical Integration Summing Up Chemistry PART THREE Chapter 8. Technological Interdependence and Consumer Needs Iron Metallurgy in France in the Nineteenth Century Generalizing the Model Chapter 9. Strategies and Social Networks Global Communities: Gas, Electricity, Automobiles Social Groups Enterprises and Networks The Pillars of Innovation Local Productive Systems PART FOUR Chapter 10. From Early Modern Times to the 1880s The English Model The Rise of Mass Civilization in Paris, 1830-1880 Chapter 11. Technological Networks and Communications French Railways: Rationalization and Cybernetics Interconnections: Networks of Electricity Mass Consumption Mass Production The Rise of Communications Telecommunications The Birth of a Communications Society Chapter 12. From Microprocessors to the Internet Flexible Production Telecommunications Information and Audiovisual Technologies Computer Networks and the Birth of the Internet Communications of a Large Network: the SNCF The Social Life of Networks, 1995-2008 Chapter 13. Information Technology and Society Enterprises Objects of Daily Life The Era of the Internet and Cellular Phones The Nature of Messages Social Connections The Unforeseen Outcome Conclusion Bibliography Name Index