New Profession, Old Order

"Kees Gispen's splendid book, the first full-length study in English of the subject, challenges historical clichés from the very beginning....Gispen's sensitive analysis draws fruitfully upon the Anglo-American literature on professionalisation....The value of Gispen's comprehensive analysis as an antidote to tendentious judgements--whether made by over-enthusiastic contemporaries in Britain or by historians--on the prestige of 19th century German engineering will be obvious. There are lessons, too, for those not principally concerned with such a distant past. Historians of the Nazi era will in particular find substantial hints for their own work....It seems destined to become both the standard work in its particular field and, in the sensibility and breadth of its analysis, an inspiration for all those studying the professionalisation of engineers, whichever country forms the primary focus of their interest." Colin Divall, Science and Public Policy

• List of tables; List of figures; Preface; Abbreviations; Introduction; Part I. Emulation: Bildung and the Bureaucratic Order: 1. technical education and society before 1850; 2. Nationalism, industrialization, and technology: the first years of the Verein Deutscher Ingenieure; 3. The pursuit of Bildung: Grashof and the VDI, 1856–76; 4. The reform of technical education in Prussia, 1876–9; Part II. Reorientation: industrial capitalism and a 'practical' profession: 5. Reorientation in the engineering industry, 1876–84; 6. Crisis and renewal in the VDI, 1877–90; 7. The rebirth of nonacademic engineering education, 1879–1901; 8. Public authority, private power, and the production of engineering personnel, 1901–14; Part III. The crucible: technical careers and managerial power, 1900–14: 9. Career prospects and the Btib's reform efforts; 10. The unified employment code and the Patent Law; 11. Direct action; 12. The reaction of the VDDI; Epilogue; Appendix; Bibliographical note; Index.