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Page 1
Executive Summary
Introduction
The Committee on the Education and Utilization of the Engineer
formed the Panel on Engineering Interactions With Society to
examine broad questions regarding the functioning of the
engineering profession in the context of, and in relation to,
American society. Although harder to grasp and quantify than other
aspects of engineering education and practice, these topics were
considered important because of the enormous extent to which the
interests of society and the engineering profession are
intertwined. Our economic and social health depends directly on the
health of the engineering endeavor, and the health of engineering
depends, in turn, on the support of society.
The purpose of the panel's inquiry was thus twofold. First, it
examined the impact that engineering and technology development has
had on the development of the nation and, correspondingly, the
impact of societal demands, values, and perceptions on engineering.
The object here was to determine how the engineering community has
responded to those societal interests and demands. Second, the
panel attempted to assess the structure and development of the
engineering profession, past and present, to ascertain whether or
not the profession is likely to be adaptable enough to meet current
and future national needs.
Background
Traditionally, the engineer has been held in considerable esteem
in the United States. The concepts of the ''heroic engineer'' and
the "wiz-
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Page 1
Executive Summary
Introduction
The Committee on the Education and Utilization of the Engineer
formed the Panel on Engineering Interactions With Society to
examine broad questions regarding the functioning of the
engineering profession in the context of, and in relation to,
American society. Although harder to grasp and quantify than other
aspects of engineering education and practice, these topics were
considered important because of the enormous extent to which the
interests of society and the engineering profession are
intertwined. Our economic and social health depends directly on the
health of the engineering endeavor, and the health of engineering
depends, in turn, on the support of society.
The purpose of the panel's inquiry was thus twofold. First, it
examined the impact that engineering and technology development has
had on the development of the nation and, correspondingly, the
impact of societal demands, values, and perceptions on engineering.
The object here was to determine how the engineering community has
responded to those societal interests and demands. Second, the
panel attempted to assess the structure and development of the
engineering profession, past and present, to ascertain whether or
not the profession is likely to be adaptable enough to meet current
and future national needs.
Background
Traditionally, the engineer has been held in considerable esteem
in the United States. The concepts of the ''heroic engineer'' and
the "wiz-
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Page 2
ard" inventor have been a prominent part of American folklore,
interwoven with enthusiasm for exploration and development of the
land and pride in American ingenuity. But in recent decades the
American public has become less enamored of engineers and
engineering. A duality of image has developed in which, on the one
hand, the engineer is admired for his inventiveness, competence,
and practicality; while on the other hand he is often viewed as a
corporate "yes-man" of conservative views and little social
conscience or consciousness. Mistrust of technology and
dissatisfaction with its fruits have become significant new
elements in American society. Engineers are seen as having lost
their traditional aura of heroism and individuality, to have become
anonymous team members, soldiers in the corporate army.
This change in image has important implications for the practice
of engineering. Perhaps the new image is exaggerated, but it is
nonetheless true that exaggerated images can carry great weight in
decision making today, particularly when those decisions are made
partly on the basis of public attitudes and opinions. More
generally, our trust or mistrust of governing institutions often
seems to revolve around these matters. In a very real sense, our
society's view of itself continues to be partly tied to its
view—whether good or ill—of technology and of our
national talent for pursuing it.
For these reasons, the panel focused much of its attention on
the historical development of the engineering profession, believing
that some understanding of the evolution of American engineering in
the societal context is essential for understanding its current
structure and status.
Historical Development
Engineering began in America with the building of forts,
arsenals, and roads. Engineering for military purposes
predominated, but the growing population greatly needed
transportation systems, buildings, agricultural implements, public
works such as sewer and water supply systems, and machine-made
products of all kinds. The first engineers in the United States
were European; they brought with them to America their European
training and European technology. It was not until after the
founding of West Point in 1802 that American-born engineers began
to appear. As demand for engineering skills was slow to develop,
engineering schools were slow to emerge: For almost the first half
of the nineteenth century, only West Point and Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute graduated American engineers.
Civil engineering was the first engineering discipline to attain
professional status in the United States. By mid-century,
mechanical engi-
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neering had also emerged, as experimentation in machine-shop
production of arms, tools, and other implements grew more
sophisticated. The central accomplishment of American machine
technology in this period was a standardized system for production
of parts called the "American System" of manufacturing. This
technique, combined with a penchant for innovation and simple,
elegant design, began to provide the United States with
technological autonomy and to build the foundations of an
independent economic strength.
As the population increased and development expanded across the
continent, the demand for engineering goods and services continued
to grow. To meet these and other educational needs, the federal
government began in 1862 (under the auspices of the Morrill Act) to
support higher education. This federally subsidized land-grant
college system gave great impetus to engineering education, making
possible a more scientific approach to technical problems.
As a result, the profession began to diversify. Out of civil and
mechanical engineering grew mining and metallurgical engineering.
Mechanical engineering became more specialized, and by the
beginning of the twentieth century a new emphasis on science in
engineering had spawned first electrical, then chemical
engineering. Industrial engineering (initially a branch of
mechanical engineering) developed to systematize further the
manufacturing process—especially in the burgeoning auto
industry. Work roles also diversified: While military and
independent consulting engineers had predominated earlier,
corporations became the predominant force for technology
development, and specialized assignments within a project team
became the rule. Professional standing, for an engineer, was now
very closely aligned with corporate standing.
Wars were strong stimulants to engineering in the United States.
Taking World Wars I and II together, government direction of
research and development (R&D) for the war effort led to
postwar booms in chemical, aeronautical (later aerospace), radio,
electronics, nuclear, and computer engineering. Even the Great
Depression spurred engineering, through massive government funding
of such projects as the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Rural
Electrification Administration. Engineering had become the nucleus
of the nation's phenomenal productivity and economic strength.
Structural Characteristics
The panel was able to make certain general observations about
the internal and external forces that helped to shape the
engineering profession in the United States throughout its early
development. These
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early, formative processes gave the profession much of its
contemporary structure and set patterns for its societal role,
status, and function.
• Societal Demand for Goods and Services. On a large
scale this "demand-pull" appears to have been the primary driver of
technology development, and particularly of growth in established
technologies.
• Undeveloped Societal Demand. When demand for a
product or a service is latent, entrepreneurs (or, in the
present-day context, market analysts) may identify the potential
demand and develop the technological means to fulfill it.
• Technology Transfer. The availability of new
technologies through transfer into a society or from one sector of
society to another is another force that sparks demand.
• Indigenous Advances in Technology. Autonomous
technology development, whether through purposive effort or
accidental discovery, can create demand if the new technology
answers existing societal needs. This is the "supply-push"
factor.
• Infrastructure Development. Institutional
components must be developed to support the engineering enterprise.
These elements are: (a) educational institutions, (b) competitive
corporations, (c) research facilities, and (d) technical
communication networks.
• Support by Key Individuals. It is most often
individuals, not institutions, who bring about needed changes in
traditional practices and entrenched points of view.
• Government Support. Because of the scale of
actions needed to foster broad change or development in the
engineering profession, government support of and intervention in
the technology development process is crucial.
• Supportive Societal Environment. There must be a
social climate that is conducive to technology development and
engineering activity. Key contributory conditions are: (a) societal
approval of technological advancement; (b) acceptance by the
political and financial "establishment"; and (c) existence of a
facilitating market structure.
A key characteristic of the profession has been that it tends to
follow quite closely the market for goods and services it provides.
Both the individual practitioner and the engineering disciplines
are highly responsive to perceived societal demand, although this
responsiveness can create problems for engineering education as
well as for the engineering employee. Thus, the profession's
adaptability is a strong point in that it contributes to economic
security, but it is a weak point in that professional engineers are
dependent on forces that are largely out of their control.
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A related point concerns the great diversification that the
response to demand has created among engineering disciplines over
time. The existence of numerous separate branches gives rise to a
tendency toward narrow specialization in engineers and their
institutions (especially in schools and professional societies).
Diversity may thus have reduced the cohesiveness of the engineering
profession, so that there is less of the sense of shared
commitments and values that is found among other well-established
professions.
Features of the Present Era
In the period since World War II, the most dominant feature of
the environment in which engineering has functioned has been
change—rapid, even revolutionary change in nearly every aspect
of life and work. In this environment, the impact of all the forces
noted earlier has intensified. The panel identified four factors of
particular importance for the present-day engineering profession:
(1) a great expansion of the roles of government; (2) a rapid
increase in the amount of information present in daily life and
work; (3) the accelerating rate of technology development; and (4)
the internationalization of business and the marketplace.
The large-scale support of national technological, social, and
economic objectives by the federal government in the postwar period
has led to a variety of new federal agencies. These in turn have
led to a boom in the employment of engineers by government, both
directly and indirectly, and to the emergence of new engineering
disciplines in response to massive government funding of R&D
programs. The scale of government-funded programs, particularly in
defense, has caused public/defense needs to surpass the
private/commercial market as the primary driver of development in
engineering.
The major new development in the "information explosion" has of
course been the advent of the computer. As a new technology the
computer may ultimately surpass the steam engine in its impact on
the way business is done and, indeed, on the very nature of
business. These machines generate a self-perpetuating demand for
the technology they embody. As a result, in the past 15 years there
has been a nearly exponential rise in demand for electronics
engineers and software and computer engineers, placing considerable
stress on the engineering educational system.
The revolution in information products has been both a cause and
an effect of the great postwar increase in the rate of technology
development in general. The overall rate of technological change
has come to exert considerable stress on the engineering system. At
the same time,
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the rise of powerful international competition in nearly every
aspect of technology development and marketing increases the
pressure. The rate of technology development, the quality of
engineering education, and the role of the engineer in society are
all far more critical under such competitive circumstances than
they were when American dominance of virtually every technical
field was secure.
The impacts on the engineering profession are numerous and, in
some cases, profound. For example, the trend toward greater
specialization has left engineers more vulnerable to "technological
obsolescence" in the marketplace. Nevertheless, there has certainly
been strong evidence of the profession's adaptability in the face
of technological change. The shift from vacuum tubes to transistors
to integrated circuits in the electronic engineering field is one
instance; the very rapid cross-disciplinary movement into the new
aerospace field and, more recently, into composite structures
provide two more examples. One reason for this flexibility seems to
be that engineering is more interdisciplinary than in the past, so
that engineers (while highly specialized) are also able to adopt a
"systems approach" to their profession.
The contemporary environment has also placed a great deal of
stress on engineering education. The degree of technological change
means that schools are unable to keep laboratory and teaching
equipment up to date. Fluctuating industry demand brings shifting
patterns of enrollment, with great overenrollments in some
disciplines. The problem is exacerbated by chronic faculty
shortages. Shifts in the economy and in student attitudes also
affect enrollment. Schools in general are not well equipped to deal
with these fluctuations.
There are also impacts on employment. For example, a growing
emphasis on the business aspects of engineering in the postwar
period has led many engineers to acquire management training to
enhance their professional status and abilities. More generally,
the high rate of technological and economic change creates a sense
of turbulence in some engineering-oriented industries. Whether
there are shortages of engineers or not, this turbulence generates
a sense of shortage, compounded by the fact that engineers
in high-demand fields switch jobs frequently to obtain higher
salaries. In addition, with more public attention to technological
matters has come an increase in ethical concerns associated with
engineering work, particularly in environment-related fields such
as the chemical and automotive industries and in the whole area of
nuclear energy (for both power generation and defense).
With the expansion of government's role in engineering,
significant differences are seen between engineering in government
and in indus-
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try. These are primarily due to the basic difference in
objectives of the private and public sector organizations: profit
making on the one hand, and the performance of public functions and
services on the other. The number of government engineers who
perform design and development work is relatively small; instead,
the majority are primarily involved in the planning and management
of contractor services. Most engineers in civil service are also
necessarily more attuned to broad social needs and concerns
relating to their work than are their counterparts in industry.
Finally, there is also a prevailing perception that
salaries—particularly in the lower and upper ranges—are
lower in government than for comparable positions in industry, and
that facilities and support also compare poorly. Because of this
image problem, government today has difficulty attracting large
numbers of highly qualified engineers.
As was pointed out earlier, the postwar period has also seen a
rapid increase in the awareness and public scrutiny of engineering
activities by the general public. By the 1970s, changing attitudes
had given rise to prevalent "antitechnology" attitudes, deriving
perhaps from rising general levels of education as well as the
greatly expanded capacity of technology for doing harm to
individuals, the environment, and society itself. Engineers have
tended to be wary of becoming involved in such politically and
emotionally charged questions. However, while antitechnology
pressures will ebb and flow, they have become an ever-present fact
of life. Engineers and engineering will continue to be scrutinized
on the one hand and, on the other, asked to perform miracles.
Engineering and Society: The Dynamics
of Interaction
Based on its examination of past and present characteristics and
tendencies of the engineering profession, the panel attempted to
formulate a generalized, informal model of the dynamic interactions
of engineering with the larger society. That formulation is briefly
summarized here.
Supply and Demand
• The demand-pull factor is the principal driver of
technology development and the production of engineers.
• The supply-push of scientific advances is one of the
primary stimulants to industry demand for engineers.
• To date, there has been sufficient flexibility in the
engineering
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supply system to meet societal demand for technology-based goods
and services.
• The system has been able to respond to changing demand
for three reasons: (1) the engineering educational system is
flexible enough to adapt institutionally and pedagogically to new
requirements; (2) students react quickly to economic signals in
opting to study engineering and in choosing specific fields of
engineering study; and (3) change has seldom occurred more rapidly
than individual engineers could adapt.
• Engineering institutions reflect the compartmental
structure established in the nineteenth century. However, schools
have adapted to demands for interdisciplinary engineering study; in
addition, intra-and interdisciplinary movement of engineers has not
been prevented.
• Use of foreign engineers trained in the United States is
another mechanism for meeting demand.
• Because it takes at least four years to educate an
engineer, there is necessarily an out-of-phase quality to the time
frames in which demand and supply operate.
• In a context of rapid technological advancement and
numerous weaknesses in the educational system, it has become
increasingly difficult for industry's changing expectations to be
met within the confines of the present system.
• Factors that may limit supply response in the future
include.
—a demographic decline in the population of
18-year-olds
—variable academic ability of the student pool
—a decline in math/science literacy among secondary-school
students
—a drop in the relative attractiveness of engineering jobs
in an improving economy.
Maintaining Adaptability
• The focus of the delivery system for engineers is the
engineering educational system, where stresses resulting from
changes in the nature and intensity of demand are most acutely
felt.
• Engineering education is subjected to conflicting
pressures for: (1) greater specialization; (2)broader, more general
technical education; and (3) the inclusion of more extensive
general education content such as liberal arts) in the engineering
curriculum.
• The avoidance of technological obsolescence requires that
engineers obtain an education featuring a good balance of
specialization and breadth of courses.
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• Some educational options that afford greater flexibility
are:
—emphasis on basic studies in the first two to three
years
—five-year degree programs
—cooperative education
—continuing education at home, in school, or on the
job.
Managing Change
In terms of its effect on society, automation in the form of
computerized systems is the most significant technological change
presently in the offing. The issue of technological unemployment
may come to have even more negative effects than did the
environmental issue.
The outlook is for substantial displacement of workers in both
the manufacturing and service sectors, but it is impossible to
predict the amount of either. Automation will also create jobs at a
substantial rate in both the manufacturing and service sectors, but
not sufficiently to offset jobs lost. Computer-aided design and
manufacturing systems will likely displace many engineers in the
manufacturing sector. Nevertheless, with reduction of the work
force in general, engineers are expected to represent a higher
percentage of the manufacturing work force than they do now.
Because changes in technology usually bring new industries and
new demand, they generally alter employment rather than reduce it.
If change is managed well by society, an overall improvement of the
quality of life can be achieved. As in the case of environmental
problems in the 1970s, the government may have to intervene
(directly or indirectly) in labor displacement if the application
of technology is to proceed smoothly. What is needed are carefully
thought-out social and technological interventions.
Outlook for the Future
In the past, the engineering supply system has demonstrated
sufficient flexibility to respond to changing demand. However,
changes in the nature and scope of business, in technology, and in
societal attitudes and values will affect the demand for engineers
and engineering-related products. The elasticity of the supply
system will be tested. In addition, unforeseen changes in the
engineering environment may further stress the supply system. To
acquire some understanding of how the system might function under
possible future conditions, the panel proposed a set of
hypothetical situations ("scenarios") that would
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affect engineering to one extent or another. The six scenarios
examined were:
1. Continued development toward unmanned factory operation,
resulting in the United States regaining world leadership in
"smokestack" industries (or, alternatively, losing its
competitiveness in manufacturing altogether).
2. Attainment of a recognized capability for commercial
utilization of space facilitated by reliable space transportation
and permanent in-orbit space manufacturing and laboratory
facilities.
3. A major new environmental crisis: large-scale contamination
of groundwater resources.
4. Widespread adoption of automated teaching via computer.
5. Rapid shift to use of composite materials as a replacement
for metals.
6. Sharp fluctuations in the federal budget for defense
R&D.
None of the scenarios examined by the panel appeared to exceed
the capacity of the engineering supply system to respond and adapt.
But it should be noted that the hypothetical scenarios were
examined in isolation, as if each were the only unusual stress
being felt at a given time. In reality it is likely that two or
more such events would be taking place simultaneously, with
combined effects that would be much more difficult to predict and,
possibly, to withstand.
Because of the uncertainty about what events—and how
many—might occur that would affect engineering, it cannot be
simply assumed that the engineering supply system is well equipped
to meet any conceivable future. Each of the scenarios would create
stress within the engineering community. Even today there are
numerous problems of engineering manpower supply, particularly in
the area of education. Many of these problems have their basis in
societal attitudes toward engineering and technology, or in a lack
of public understanding of the technology development process, or
in a lack of awareness on the part of engineers of the social
ramifications of their work.
Close attention to these problem areas is needed if the
interaction between engineering and the American society of which
it is a part is to continue to function satisfactorily.
Accordingly, the panel directs the reader to the conclusions and
recommendations presented at the end of the report.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
engineering supply
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