Britain in perspective: The European context of industrial training and innovation, 1880-1914

In an influential book published in 1981, Martin Wiener identified cultural conservatism as a long-standing impediment to the development of science, technology, and industry in England. This approach to the analysis of the country's flagging industrial performance is, in reality, less original than the excited response to Wiener's book would suggest: the purist, literary bias in English culture has been blamed for the low status of industrial and commercial activity ever since the 1850s, when Lyon Playfair was among the leading advocates of the thesis. The authors of this paper believe that the effect of national styles in culture on industrial performance, though not negligible, has been exaggerated and that it should be re-examined. They use two main arguments, both developed with special reference to the period from 1880 to 1914 which must be regarded as decisive for the growth of modern science-based industry in Europe. First, they show, by a comparison with France, Germany, and Italy, that Britain was by no means alone in her cultural conservatism. Secondly, it is suggested that once the focus is directed to the manufacturing towns, the interaction between culture and industrial and educational practice appears far more complex than it does from an analysis based on the pronouncements of the leaders of British culture in London and the ancient universities.