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Technology in decline: a search for useful concepts

The case of the Dutch madder industry in the nineteenth century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

Anthony S. Travis ,
Willem J. Hornix ,
Robert Bud  and
Johan Schot
Johan Schot
Affiliation:
Center for Studies of Science, Technology and Society, University of Twente, TW Building, RC 302, PO Box 217, 7500 AE Enschede, The Netherlands.
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Extract

Until late in the nineteenth century, madder was the most popular natural red dye. Holland was the largest and best-known supplier. As early as the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the province of Zeeland and adjoining parts of the provinces of South Holland and Brabant developed into important producers. In the course of the seventeenth century these areas even succeeded in acquiring a monopoly position. Early in the nineteenth century, however, this position came under attack because France had gone over to industrial production methods from around 1800, whereas Holland continued to produce with craft technologies. After 1820, as a result, a period of stagnation and decay set in. The fate of the Dutch madder industry would have been completely sealed if the production capacity of the French factories had been sufficiently large to satisfy the great increase in demand. Consequently, in Holland, after 1845, a process of revival based upon the French manufacturing methods began slowly and hesitatingly. This process started too late and was not persevered with sufficiently to regain lost markets. The Dutch producers remained strongly attached to their own out-dated, craft methods of production.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal for the History of Science , Volume 25 , Issue 1 , March 1992 , pp. 5 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © British Society for the History of Science 1992

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References

An earlier version of this article was presented at ‘The Study of Science and Technology in the 1990s’, conference of the Society for Social Studies and the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology, Amsterdam, 16–19 November 1988. Thanks to the encouragement of Robert Bud, I have developed that paper into this article. For comments and suggestions I am indebted to Arie Rip. The study of original sources was supported by the Commissie Regionale Geschiedbeoefcning Zeeland.

1 For this standard view see Wiskerke, C., ‘De geschiedenis van het meekrapbedrijf in Nederland’, Economisch-Historisch Jaarboek (1952), 25, 1–144Google Scholar. For an overview of the literature see Schot, J. W., ‘De meekrapnijverheid: de ontwikkeling van de techniek als een proces van variatie en selectie’, Jaarboek voor de Geschiedenis van Bedrijf en Techniek (1986), 3, 43–62Google Scholar; Schot, J. W., ‘Het meekrapbedrijf in Nederland in de negentiende eeuw opniew bezien in het licht van het industrialisatiedebat’, Economisch- en Sociaal-Historisch Jaarboek (1987), 50, 77–111Google Scholar. Both articles are based mainly on Schot, J. W., ‘De ontwikkeling van de techniek als een variatie en selectieproces. De meekrapteelt en -bereiding in het licht van een alternatieve techniekopvatting’, M.Sc., Erasmus University Rotterdam, 03 1985Google Scholar. Sources for the thesis and other articles: (1) Archives of 15 madder stove operators and companies: Archief van de Maatschap Wilhelminapolder, Archief van de Maatschappij Wilhelminapolder, Wilhelminadorp; Archief van de meestoof de Waereld 1790–1859, Archief van de meestoof't Hart, Archief van de meestoof de Koe, Streekarchivariaat Schouwen en Duiveland, Zierikzee; Archief van de zuid-binne-meestoof de Lelie 1814–64, Streekarchivariaat Schouwen en Duiveland, Brouwer-schaven; Archief van de meestoof de Zee 1842–65, Streekarchivariaat Schouwen en Duiveland, Elkerzee; Archief van de meestof Welland 1687–1890, Archief van de meestoof Renesse 1796–1892, Streekarchivariaat Schouwen en Duiveland, Westerschouwen: Archief van de meestof de Balans 1745–1865, Streekarchivariaat Nassau Brabant, Steenbergen; Archief van de meestoof de Zon 1800–94, Archief van de N. V. Maatschappij van verbeterde meekrapbereiding in Zeeland te Goes 1852–54, Gemeentearchief Goes; Archieven van de meestoven te Brouwenshaven, Bruinisse, Dreischor, Bommede en Ooltgensplaat, Nederlands Economisch Historisch Archief Amsterdam. (2) Archives of regional commissions and other public bodies: Archief van de Commissie van Landbouw in de provincie Zeeland 1813–50, Rijksarchief Middelburg; Archief van de Zeeuwse Land-bouwmaatschappij 1843–1940, Rijksarchief Middelburg; Archief van de Kamer van Koophandel 1816–1921, Gemeentearchief Rotterdam. (3) National Archives, of which the most important are Archief van het Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken 1815–48 en 1848–76, Afdeling Onderwijs, Kunsten en Wetenschappen, Archief van de administratie der Nationale Nijverheid 1813–77, Archief van de Algemene Staatssecretarie en van het Kabinets des Konings met de daarbij geponeerde archieven 1813–40 en 1841–97, Algemeen Rijksarchief, tweede afdeling Den Haag. These archives contain patent descriptions and correspondence, and general descriptions of the economic development of the madder industry.

2 Staudenmaier, J. M., Technology's Storytellers: Reweaving the Human Fabric, Cambridge, MA, 1985Google Scholar. Staudenmaier's analysis of the contents of all articles which appeared in Technology and Culture between 1959 and 1980Google Scholar, indicates that the theme ‘decline of technology’ is not discussed. Some attention is devoted to what Staudenmaier calls inertia (p. 152). Hughes, T. P., ‘The evolution of large technological Systems’, in The Social Construction of Technological Systems. New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology (ed. Bijker, W. E., Hughes, T. P. and Pinch, T.), Cambridge, Mass., 1987, 51–82Google Scholar, is the only author I am aware of who calls for more attention to the decline stage, in his case of large technical Systems.

3 For a short introduction see Rosenberg, N., Perspectives in Technology, Cambridge, 1976, 61–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Staudenmaier, , op. cit. (2), 55–61.Google Scholar

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8 The preparation process is described by, among others, the Englishman Philip Miller in an espionage report of 1758, The Method of Cultivating Madder, As it is now Practised by the Dutch in Zealand, London, 1758Google Scholar. Britain was dependent upon Holland for the dye which was so important for her textile industry. The purpose of Miller's journey was to enquire into the way madder was cultivated and prepared in Holland. However, his report did not lead to the development of a madder industry of any size in England. For the description of the Dutch technology, I have also made use of de Kanter, J., De meekrapteeler en bereider of volledige beschrijving van het planten, telen, reeden, en bereiden der meekrap, Middelburg, 1802Google Scholar; Ochtman, J. H., Verslag der Verbeter-de meekrap-bereiding in de meestoof Het Hart te Zierikzee, Teelt 1851–1852, Zierikzee, 1852Google Scholar; van den Bosch, I. G. J., Over den verbouw en de bereiding der meekrap in het Departement Vaucluse in verband met der meekrap-teelt in Zeeland, Middelburg, 1850Google Scholar; Bleekrode, S. and Verhagen, O., Beschouwingen over de meekrapbereiding, Goes, 1852Google Scholar. Supplementary information is derived from primary archives, especially patent descriptions, op. cit. (1). For a description of the French technology I have made use of, in addition to the Dutch sources and literature, Girardin, M. J., Technologie de la garance, Mémoire présente a l'Academie Royale des Sciences de Rouen, le 21 juillet 1843, Paris, 1844Google Scholar and Peeters, A., ‘Les plantes tinctoriales dans l'économie du Vaucluse au XIXe siècle’, Etudes Rurales (1975), 60, 41–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 The crisis is visible in the sharp decline of production. See Schot, J. W., op. cit. (1), especially 84.Google Scholar

10 The committee's report was published as Rapport der commissie uit de Maatschappij van Landbouw en Veeteelt in de provincie Zeeland, benoemd ter algemene vergadering der Maatschappij, gehouden te Goes, Middelburg, 1846.Google Scholar

11 Whether or not the French production process for garancine differed from the Dutch, I have so far been unable to ascertain. Several sources do state that the garancine manufacturers experimented with the production process.

12 In the madder case, proponents of the new technology tried to prove its superiority on the basis of a cost comparison. See for instance, Van den Bosch, , op. cit. (8), especially 59–60Google Scholar; Bleekrode, and Verhagen, , op. cit. (8), 23–4Google Scholar; and Rapport der commissie, op. cit. (10), 15–16Google Scholar. However, other sources contradict their calculations: a cost comparison, as calculatcd by the owners of the madder stove ‘De Zon’, showed that the costs of using a steam engine were at least equal to those of using horses; Archief van de meestoof de Zon 1800–94, Stoofboek, Gemeentearchief Goes. To argue for the superiority of a new technology on the basis of cost comparisons is often not very convincing. Cost comparisons are not unambiguous and objective, and are easy to manipulate. There are more fundamental objections against the use of cost comparisons as well. It is supposed, following Gold, B., ‘On the adoption of technological innovations in industry: superficial models and complex decision processes’, in The Trouble with Technology, Explorations in the Process of Technological Change (ed. MacDonald, S., Lamberton, D. and Manderville, T.), London 1983, 104–21, 105Google Scholar, that ‘a specific innovation is progressively adopted by an unchanging and essentially homogeneous population of potential users. Such prospective users are assumed to have fixed and basically similar objectives, operations, products, decision-making processes and evaluative criteria; they are expected to differ significantly only in respect to their respective estimates of the…profitability of the innovation…Accordingly, diffusion rates are expected to change over time as a resuit of adjustments in the costs of adopting the innovation’ (cit. p. 105). Gold claims, in addition, that diffusion patterns suggest that firms arrive at quite different evaluations of the same innovation more or less simultaneously (p. 108). Furthermore, from several case studies it is clear that expected profitability and cost advantages are seldom the basis for adoption of new technologies. See, for instance, the case studies in Ray, op. cit. (5).

13 Law, J., ‘The structure of sociotechnical engineering. A review of the new sociology of technology’, Sociological Review (1987), 35, 404–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Callon, M., ‘Society in the making: the study of technology as a tool for sociological analysis’Google Scholar, in Bijker, , Hughes, and Pinch, (eds.), op. cit. (2), 83–107.Google Scholar

14 For this argument see Constant, E. W., The Origins of the Turbojet Revolution, Baltimore, 1980Google Scholar, and Gold, , op. cit. (12), 108.Google Scholar

15 For an overview of the sociological and historical literature see MacKenzie, D. and Wajcman, J. (eds.), The Social Shaping of Technology, How the Refrigerator got its Hum, Philadelphia, 1985Google Scholar; Bijker, , Hughes, and Pinch, (eds.), op. cit. (2)Google Scholar, and Staudenmaier, , op. cit. (2)Google Scholar. For an overview of the economic literature see Dosi, G. et al. (eds.), Technical Change and Economic Theory, London, 1988.Google Scholar

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19 Bijker, W. E., ‘The social construction of bakelite: towards a theory of invention’Google Scholar, in Bijker, W. E., Hughes, T. P. and Pinch, T. (eds.), op. cit. (2), 159–60.Google Scholar

20 Dosi, G., ‘Technological paradigms and technological trajectories: a suggested interpretation of the determinants and directions of technological change’, Research Policy (1982), 11, 147–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21 Bijker, , op. cit. (19), 172.Google Scholar

22 Ibid.

23 For a more general theory about rule making see Burns, T. R. and Flam, H., The Shaping of Social Organisation, Social Rule System Theory with Applications, London, 1987Google Scholar. For applications to technological development see Rip, A., Expectations and Strategic Niche Management in Technological Development (and a Cognitive Approach to Technology Policy), paper presented at the International Conference ‘Inside the Black Box’,Turin,16–17 June 1989Google Scholar; Schot, J. W., ‘Constructive technology assessment and technology dynamics: opportunities for the control of technology. The case of clean technologies’, Science, Technology and Human Values, (1992), 17, 36–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24 Davis, K., Power under the Microscope, Dordrecht, 1988, 87–9.Google Scholar

25 See, for the argument, and focusing on the design process, Clark, K. B., ‘The interaction of design hierarchies and market concepts in technological evolution’, Research Policy (1985), 14, 235–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

26 For the lock-in and path-dependency argument see Arthur, B., ‘Competing technologies: an overview’, in Dosi, et al. (eds.), op. cit. (15), 590–608Google Scholar, and David, P., ‘Clio and the economies of QWERTY’, American Economic Review (1985), 75, 332–7Google Scholar, which offers the paradigmatic example of lock-in development, the QWERTY keyboard in typewriters. Although it was designed to meet problems which subsequent developmensts have overcome, and is no longer the optimal keyboard, the QWERTY standard has remained dominant. One reason for this is the specific skills of typists trained in QWERTY. The typewriter technology is locked into the QWERTY path.

27 For an overview of the regulation see Wiskerke, C., ‘De geschiedenis van het meekrapbedrijf in Nederland’, Economisch-Historisch Jaarboek (1952), 25, 1–144, especially 85–124.Google Scholar

28 For this calculation see Mol, J. A., ‘De meestoof “In de Vlugt” te Nisse 1860–1893’, Historisch Jaarboek van Zuid- en Noord Beveland (1982), 8, 58–81, especially 67.Google Scholar