The Tentacles of Progress : Technology Transfer in the Age of Imperialism, 1850-1940

Daniel Headrick examines why the massive transfer of Western technology to European colonies did not spark an industrial revolution in those countries. Rather than spurring economic progress, he argues, the transfer of stock technology between 1850 and 1940 caused the traditional self-sufficient economies of the colonial regions to be stuck in a state of underdevelopment, a legacy which burdens these countries to this day.

In this trenchant examination of a paradox of colonial rule, Daniel Headrick, author of the widely acclaimed Tools of Empire, shows how the massive transfers of technology—including equipment, techniques, and experts—from the European imperial powers to their colonies in Asia and Africa led not to industrialization but to underdevelopment. He argues that colonial rulers dissociated the geographic transfer of technology from its cultural diffusion by allowing only Europeans access to technical educations and discouraging non-European entrepreneurs. Examining the most important technologies—shipping and railways, telegraphs and wireless, urban water supply and sewage disposal, economic botany and plantation agriculture, irrigation, and mining and metallurgy—Headrick provides a new perspective on colonial economic history and reopens the debate on the roots of Asian and African underdevelopment.

This penetrating examination of a paradox of colonial rule shows how the massive transfers of technology--including equipment, techniques, and experts--from the European imperial powers to their colonies in Asia and Africa resulted not in industrialization but in underdevelopment. Examining the most important technologies--shipping and railways, telegraphs and wireless, urban water supply and sewage disposal, economic botany and plantation agriculture, irrigation, and mining and metallurgy--Headrick provides a new perspective on colonial economic history and reopens the debate on the roots of Asian and African underdevelopment. Daniel Headrick, author of Tools of Empire, examines why the massive transfer of Western technology to European colonies did not spark an industrial revolution in those countries. Rather than spurring economic progress, he argues, the transfer of stock technology between 1850 and 1940 caused the traditional self-sufficient economies of the colonial regions to become mired in a state of underdevelopment, a legacy which burdens these countries to this day.