Wiebe Bijker: Of Bicycles, Bakelites, and Bulbs

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Wiebe Bijker Of Bicycles, Bakelites, and Bulbs

• Toward a Theory of Sociotechnical Change

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Introduction

• Understanding the place of technology in our
  lives and in our society.
• Examples from three technological advances
• The safety bicycle
• Bakelite plastic
• Fluorescent bulbs
• Technology and society are human constructs

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Bijker (beé-ker)

• Dutch engineering student in the 1970s
• Drawn to Science Technology Society movement
  (STS)
• Risks of nuclear energy
• Environmental degradation
• Followed Social Construction of Technology
  apprach (SCOT)

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Classification, bad

• Tried to dissolve STS boundaries
• Seamless web
• Abhorred linear thinking

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A vague diagram
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Summary

• Technological inventions are created within
  society cannot be viewed distinctly
• Gives three concrete stories and ties them in to
  their societal frameworks
• Keywords
• Relevant Social Group
• Interpretive Flexibility Closure/Stabilization
• Technological Frame
• Power

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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles

• Early 19th century, Baron von Drais draisenne

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Part 1 Of Bicycles

• Early 19th century, Baron von Drais draisienne

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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles

• Relevant user group are the social groups
  centered around the technology, in this case, the
  Ordinary bicycle.
• Users Young men of means and nerve
• Non-users Everybody else
• Manufacturers industrialized machine industries
  de-stabilized by Franco-German war

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Part 1 Of Bicycles

• Interpretive flexibility the definition of the
  artifact according to the relevant user group
• For young men of means and nerve it is a
  working technology, slightly dangerous, but that
  was, partly, the point.
• For everybody else it is a non-working
  technology. It was unsafe.
• For manufacturers how do you develop it for
  wider use?

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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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Part 1 Of Bicycles
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The Fourth Kingdom

• The Social Construction of Bakelite

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Baekeland
Lone inventor?
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Two New Concepts

• Technological Frame
• Degree of Inclusion
• But first, some background to the story of
  Bakelite

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What is Bakelite?

• Trademark for a molding material patented by
  Baekeland in 1907
• Formed in condensation reaction that occurs when
  phenol and formaldehyde are combined
• Insoluble, infusible, and unaffected by other
  chemicals
• First truly synthetic plastic
• Moldable but hardens

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Precursors to Bakelite and Relevant Social Groups

• Old Plastics
• Resin, horn, tortoiseshells, ivory, etc. (luxury
  market)
• New Plastics Made from Natural Materials
• Rubber useful but ugly
• Celluloid useful but flammable
• Search for Synthetic Plastics
• Concern about scarcity of natural resources
• Precursors created demand for consumer products
  (emergence of new social group)
• Phenol-formaldehyde experiments

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Discovery of Bakelite

• Turn-of-the-Century
• Phenol-formaldehyde research in disarray
• Baekeland tries to find patterns in chaos
• Applies for patent for product he calls Bakelite
• Product A Liquid
• Product B Elastic
• Product C Hard yet gummy
• Product D Hard and insoluble
• Laboratory notes show he was interested in
  commercial applications

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Technological Frame

• Each relevant social group has own Technological
  Frame
• Builds when relevant social groups interact
  around an artifact
• Provides the goals, ideas and tools needed for
  action (solving problems)
• Outcome is constrained by the social group, but
  outcome is not predetermined.
• Also applies to non-technical groups such as
  consumers, managers, politicians, etc.

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Degree of Inclusion

• As actors can be members of more than one
  relevant social group, they can also be
  influenced by more than one technological frame
• Degree of inclusion in a technological frame
  depends on extent to which an actors
  interactions are structured by that frame
• Bijker Innovation often comes from inclusion in
  more than one technological frame

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Baekelands Inclusion in Technological Frames

• Photochemist
• Experience as photochemist (inventor of
  photographic paper) led him to attempt to map all
  possible variables of the phenol-formaldehyde
  reaction
• Electrochemist
• Interested in producing raw materials for
  industry (not consumer products)
• Businessman
• Interested in whether processes can be scaled up

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The Social Construction of Bakelite
Early Contacts with Industry
Museums
Consumers
Patent Litigation
Industrial Designers
Collaboration with Industry
World War I
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The social construction of fluorescent lighting

• The majesty of daylight

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Overview

• Lightbulbs invented in 1880 by Edison
• This chapter focuses on 1938-1940s
• Interplay between INDUSTRY, GOVERNMENT
  CONSUMERS
• Engineers had devised fluorescent lighting long
  before the socially constructed final product
  appeared

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Key players

• 1890s
• MAZDA LIGHTING
• Comprised GE and Westinghouse
• UTILITIES
• FIXTURE MANUFACTURERS
• PUBLIC
• GOVERNMENT

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Consolidation

• 1901
• GE, Westinghouse, Others
• Others consolidate into National Electric Lamp
  Company.
• GE provided capital by purchasing 75 of stock
• GE owns 97 of U.S. electric lighting market

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GENERAL ELECTRICAntitrust/Mergers/Cross-licensin
g
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Utility companies

• Private companies, collective organizaton
• Organized as licensees of Mazda
• Dependencies
• Understandings
• Utilities promoted Mazda lamps
• Mazda promoted higher consumption

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Fixture companies

• No electric co. made accessories
• RLM Standards Institute
• Established industry standards
• Favored Mazda
• (who happened to collaborate in the
  standardization)

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1930s

• Despite Great Depressionbelief in technology
• Technology was the buzzword
• Object, process, knowledge, symbol
• ElectricitySymbol!
• Sense of wonder

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Worlds Fair 1939

• http//xroads.virginia.edu/1930s/DISPLAY/39wf/fro
  nt.htm
• Utopian
• Introduced new technologies, including
  fluorescent lightingan opportunity!

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From tint to daylight

• Originally for tint lightingspecialty
• High-efficiency daylight fluorescent
• 3 to 200 times as much light for the same
  wattage
• Amazing efficiency
• Most economical
• Indoor daylight at last.

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Uh-oh Relevant Social Groups

• Utilities feared lost revenues
• Tried to emphasize the tinted aspect
• Even Mazda was concerned
• How long would this bulb last?
• Independents
• Hygrade-Sylvania
• Public
• Fixture Makers

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Nela Park Conference

• April 24-25, 1939 in Cleveland
• Fluorescent Council of War
• Create High-Intensity Daylight Lamp
• Nix High-Efficiency Lamp

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GE vs. the Govt.

• GEs power continues through WWII
• 2 lawsuits involving GE were dismissed because
  they interfered with the war effort
• Military was using fluorescent bulbs

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POWER

• Transitive capacity to harness the agency of
  others to comply with ones ends.
• Is exercised, not possessed
• Previously
• Economists would talk of technology without
  mentioning social power
• Sociologist would not discuss technological power.

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Semiotic power

• Reaching closure, where interpretive flexibility
  is reduced, is the first step of semiotic power.
• Which means
• More people in a relevant social group
• New relevant social groups
• Elaborating the meaning of artifacts

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Constraints Enablers

• Stabilization results in fixity of meaning
• Fixity of meaning represents power.
• Shapes technological frames which specify actions
  of relevant social group members
• Constrain actions (no high-efficiency bulbs)
• Enable actions routines, patents
• Removes controversy from history
• GE ads for high-intensity