The Mantra of Efficiency

From Waterwheel to Social Control
Erscheinungsjahr 2008
ISBN: 978-0-8018-8693-5
Verlag: Johns Hopkins University Press

Buch, Englisch, 256 Seiten, Format (B × H): 164 mm x 230 mm, Gewicht: 494 g

Winner, 2010 Edelstein Prize, Society for the History of Technology

Efficiency—associated with individual discipline, superior management, and increased profits or productivity—often counts as one of the highest virtues in Western culture. But what does it mean, exactly, to be efficient? How did this concept evolve from a means for evaluating simple machines to the mantra of progress and a prerequisite for success?

In this provocative and ambitious study, Jennifer Karns Alexander explores the growing power of efficiency in the post-industrial West. Examining the ways the concept has appeared in modern history—from a benign measure of the thermal economy of a machine to its widespread application to personal behaviors like chewing habits, spending choices, and shop floor movements to its controversial use as a measure of the business success of American slavery—she argues that beneath efficiency's seemingly endless variety lies a common theme: the pursuit of mastery through techniques of surveillance, discipline, and control.

Six historical case studies—two from Britain, one each from France and Germany, and two from the United States—illustrate the concept's fascinating development and provide context for the meanings of, and uses for, efficiency today and in the future.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Alexander, Jennifer Karns

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Mentalitäts- und Sozialgeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Europäische Geschichte
• Technische Wissenschaften Technik Allgemein Technikgeschichte

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction: The Varieties of Efficiency
1. Static and Dynamic Efficiency: The Waterwheels of Smeaton and the Franklin Institute
2. The Effects of Control: Gérard-Joseph Christian and Perfected Machines
3. Economy of Nature: Darwin, Marshall, and the Costs of Efficiency
4. Balance and Transformation: Technical and Popular Efficiency in the Progressive Era United States
5. An Island of Mechanical Predictability: Efficient Worker Seating in Late Weimar Germany
6. Pride in Efficiency: The Dispute over Time on the Cross
7. Global Efficiency: An Enduring Industrial Value in a Postindustrial World
Conclusion: The Future of Efficiency
Notes
Bibliographic Essay
Index

Über Autor(innen)

Alexander, Jennifer Karns
Jennifer Karns Alexander is an associate professor in the Program in History of Science, Technology, and Medicine and the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota.