Introduction

Abstract

There is now a considerable and growing interest in research on technological change, particularly in some of the problems that this research has generated. Interest in technological change, however, has not been constant throughout history and perceptions of technological change have undergone very considerable variations in the course of time. These variations are perhaps related to the changing role of technological change in socioeconomic development. Changes in technology have always been an important component in the progress of human societies; as long ago as the invention of the wheel and discovery of fire, and more recently in the development of wind and water mills. However, since the industrial revolution the extent and pervasiveness of the role played by technological change has undergone a qualitative change. This rapidly increasing role of technological change was noticed by observers and students of socioeconomic development at the time, but not quite in the same way in which we perceive it nowadays. Nineteenth-century economic historians, for example, could not fail to notice some of the consequences of technological change. They observed the new machines, such as Kay’s flying shuttle, the steam engine and the mule.