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Article ID: CBB963876628

A Tale of Two Mills: Socio-Technological Integration in Meiji Japan, 1868–1912 (April 2022)

Wittner, David G. (Author)

Technology and Culture
Volume: 63
Issue: 2
Pages: 349-376
Publication date: April 2022
Language: English

URI: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/854001

DOI: 10.1353/tech.2022.0050

Publication Date: April 2022
Edition Details: Special Issue - Industry in Common: Thinking Globally with Modern Japan

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Spinning Machinery Technology transfer Silk reeling Sociotechnical systems Industrialization Silk and silk industry Technology transfer Industry Cotton and cotton industry

Since the 1950s, historians have sought to explain industrial modernization in Meiji Japan as a model for developing countries. They typically attribute Japan's success to single factors such as accumulated knowledge or capital, visionary leadership, or technological choice. This article moves beyond mono-causality to examine technology transfer's role in industrial modernization. Tomioka Silk Filature and Osaka Cotton Spinning Mill make the case that components of industrialization were interrelated and a new socio-technological system was essential for technology transfer to affect a Kuhnian-style paradigm shift. Tomioka is an example of ad hoc industrialization, the gradual integration of transferred technologies, and creation of associated regimes leading to a new socio-technological system. In contrast, Osaka Cotton Mill embodies the creation of a new industrial paradigm for Japanese industry, demonstrating the essentiality of integrating numerous socio-technological elements such as adapted artifacts, bio-materials, accumulated knowledge, factory management, and geographic location.

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Article Aleksandra Kobiljski (April 2022) The Global Industrial Now. Technology and Culture (pp. 309-325). unapi

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