Engineering as a Political Activity (Chapter 12)

This chapter offered an interesting perspective; that is, the idea that things can be political without relating to elected and appointed government officials.  I agree with Woodhouse that engineering and technoscientific innovation are forms of politics.  As Woodhouse says, the decisions engineers make often affect our daily lives far more than do the decisions of elected officials.

One of my classmates mentions in her blog, sts-blog.tumblr.com, that Woodhouse seems to present two conflicting ideas; one that technoscientific innovation shapes society and political decision-making, and the other that the reverse is true.  However, I don't think that this is a contradiction; I think that both affect one another.  Government (both legislature and bureaucracy), business, technoscience, social movements, consumers, and culture all affect one another.  I think this course has been teaching us about the interplay and interconnectedness of all of those factors.

I think it's an interesting and good idea to conceptualize engineering as a political activity, because then we can better analyze engineering decisions.  Also, it implies accountability on the part of engineers, and that is a good thing.  That is, when we say that engineers make political decisions, we are telling them that they are responsible for the decisions that they make in innovation.

However, I'm not sure that it's necessarily the most accurate analogy.  I think Woodhouse's military analogy works better, particularly with respect to accountability.  Both engineers and military officers struggle with the dilemma of choosing whether to follow orders they don't agree with (or, unfortunately, may not even ask themselves whether or not they agree), though I daresay private sector engineers have less at stake as they can't be court-martialed.

This chapter connects to and builds on other concepts; who is accountable for what?  And what is accountability, really?  I'm not sure that this chapter brought much new material to the table; I feel that we have already learned and discussed the concepts in this chapter.

However, there were two concepts that I found new and interesting.  One was that farming technologies have "inexorably reduced the number of persons who could continue farming as a way of life."  I hadn't thought about it that way before, and I'm grateful for the new perspective.  This is yet more support for the organic/local/sustainable farming movement.

The other thing I found intriguing was the sentence, "Most generally, engineers as a whole have contributed to a pace of innovation that pretty clearly is ill-suited to the relatively slow pace of human learning and adaptation."  While this is a concept that Woodhouse has alluded to previously, he usually raises it a question.  This is the first time he has stated it this clearly and directly.  It's a very thought-provoking idea.  When I think about it, I am not sure whether I agree, and yet it resonates with me.  While I've often thought that modern life is too fast-paced, I didn't really connect that to the fast pace of innovation.  I'd also never thought of human learning and adaption as slow-paced.  I suppose the prevailing view is that it isn't, and perhaps that's the problem.  Perhaps we are all having a hard time feeling caught up with all of the new technologies in our lives.  Come to think of it, technology is much, much faster paced now than in pretty much any other period of human history, to my knowledge.  And each technological innovation changes our lives in significant ways.  As Woodhouse mentioned, the prevalence of cars completely changed our built environment, which in turn greatly restricts people's ability to get around without cars (thus reinforcing the system).  And a little more than 100 years ago, we did not even have cars; that's how quickly life has changed.  In addition, cell phones and the internet have both greatly changed the way humans interact with one another, and how they interact.  The internet's organizational power has enabled people with similar interests and backgrounds to connect, share ideas, and meet up.  But the internet has also isolated people.  Perhaps the fast pace of innovation is why so many people in the developed world are lonely, disaffected, or depressed.

I think it would be interesting to further explore the effects of techoscientific innovation and change on society, and explore ways to utilize this potential.