The revolt of the engineers : social responsibility and the American engineering profession

Awarded the Dexter Prize of the Society for the History of Technology. "A thoroughgoing study of the engineering profession, emphasizing,and rightly so, its accommodation to business institutions. It is a book that is suggestive, challenging, and instructive."--Technology and Culture. "First-rate."--American Historical Review. In examining the history of American engineering, this book emphasizes professionalism, social responsibility, and ethics. It explains how some engineers have attempted to express a concern for the social effects of technology and to forge codes of ethics which could articulate the profession's fundamental obligation to the public. The document's major sections address: (1) the engineer and business; (2) the evolution of the profession; (3) the ideology of engineering; (4) the politics of status; (5) the revolt of the civil engineers; (6) measuring the unmeasurable (scientific management and reform); (7) the engineer as reformer (Morris L. Cooke); (8) the engineering method personified (Herbert Hoover and the Federated American Engineering Societies); (9) the return to normalcy (1921-1929); and (10) the depression and the New Deal (the engineers ideology in decline). An epilogue entitled "The Rise of Scientific Professionalism" is followed by a bibliographic essay listing primary and secondary sources, and an index. (TW) Frontmatter Preface to the 1986 Edition (page vii) Acknowledgments (page xix) List of Abbreviations (page xxii) 1. The Engineer and Business (page 1) 2. The Evolution of a Profession (page 25) 3. The Ideology of Engineering (page 53) 4. The Politics of Status (page 79) 5. The Revolt of the Civil Engineers (page 109) 6. Measuring the Unmeasurable: Scientific Management and Reform (page 134) 7. Morris L. Cooke: The Engineer as Reformer (page 154) 8. "The Engineering Method Personified": Herbert Hoover and the Federated American Engineering Societies (page 179) 9. The Return to Normalcy, 1921-1929 (page 201) 10. Depression and New Deal: The Engineers' Ideology in Decline (page 225) Epilogue: The Rise of Scientific Professionalism (page 249) Bibliographic Essay (page 254) Index (page 271)