AI & Soc (2003) 17: 225–240

DOI 10.1007/s00146-003-0278-6
ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Klaus Ruth
Industrial culture and the innovation of innovation:
enginology or socioneering?

Received: 29 August 2002 / Accepted: 18 September 2002 / Published online: 9 October 2003
Ó Springer-Verlag London Limited 2003

Abstract This paper deals with current problems of innovation in manufac-

turing industries. The shortcomings are analysed as contradictions within
the conventional modernity. The main characteristic that makes the transition
from modernity to reflexive modernity in an era of not intentional side effects
is the omnipresent increase of uncertainties at various societal levels.
Furthermore, the emerging need for culturally appropriate regionalized
products contributes to the need for a reconsideration of innovation
assumptions and goals, which will end up with a reflexive innovation of
innovation. Finally, the innovation of innovation is embedded in the concept
of culture of manufacturing, which provides a framework for assessing the
prospects of trans-disciplinary collaboration between engineers and social
scientists.

Keywords Industrial culture Æ Manufacturing culture Æ Reflexive

modernity Æ Innovation of innovation

1 Introduction

Nowadays, if we talk about manufacturing it can look as if we were analysing a

dinosaur: a huge bigshot, but dying out. One might get this impression when
listening to the advocates of post-industrialism. But at the danger of seeming
old-fashioned, I think that there is evidence to support the expectation that
manufacturing will continue to play an important role in the near and middle

K. Ruth
Institute for Technology and Education, Breman University,
28359 Bremen, Germany
E-mail: kruth@zfn.uni-bremen.de Æ Tel.: +49-421-2184639 Æ Fax: +49-421-2184637
226

future.1 Or being more optimistic, one might say that revolutionary changes in
manufacturing will yet occur in the future, and therefore the high time of
manufacturing is ahead (for instance in bio-manufacturing and holonic archi-
tectural structures).
In any case manufacturing was, and still is, one of the most important sectors
of the industrial system and evidently had an enormous influence in shaping
industrial systems and industrial societies. Industrialisation has had a strong
impact on other spheres through the strong dissemination power of Taylorism
(such as Taylorisation of software production, housework, health care, and so
on), and on culture in its genuine meaning (see for example the notion of cultural
industry by Horkheimer and Adorno which suggests the industrialisation of
culture production such as movies).
This paper will try to relate the problems of manufacturing and innovation to
the general societal trend of modernity, or to be more precise to reflexive
modernity. It will also try to substantiate – if this is at all necessary – the
necessity and inevitability of a cultural approach to technology design and use
(or innovation) and why this requires discourses between disciplines, cultures
and communities.
The social concept of modernity is rooted in the European process of
enlightenment. This process claims to be affecting all societal spheres and
therefore also influences the sphere of production; or, to put it more clearly, the
universal modernity concept was, in the first instance, identified as a concept of
industrial modernity. It would not be an exaggeration to say industrial
modernity is modernity as such. But since modernity ran into the crisis posed in
terms of post-modernity versus reflexive modernity, this tendency affects all
‘‘partial modernities’’ and therefore above all becomes effective in the industrial
sphere.
The impacts of this process on innovation will be discussed in terms of the
culture of manufacturing, which circumscribes (and makes way for) the inno-
vation of innovation. This expression above all stands for the claim to refurbish
and reconsider the concept and understanding of innovation, its aims and
conditions. And, no less important, following the widely-accepted meaning of
innovation – as opposed to invention – these renewals (of innovation) need to be
transferred from an idea to a new practice. Therefore the innovation of inno-
vation is not accomplished until a new innovation practice is socially imple-
mented.
In the following sections the interrelated concepts of industrial and manufac-
turing culture are discussed in order to review their potentials for elucidating the
mysteries of reflexive innovation. The lines of reasoning are pushed forward on
two levels: the research level, and the level of practice that in both cases is
concerned with the relationship of social and engineering sciences. Finally some
ideas of a new synthesis of both domains will be sketched.

1
Although a trend towards an information society is discernible, there can be little doubt that
most of our consumer goods are still physical – hardware is made of metals or plastics that still
need to be manufactured, and even in the ‘‘world of computers’’ software that runs without
hardware has yet to be developed! Evidently, a shift towards bionics might change the concept
of manufacturing in the ‘‘old’’ and narrow meaning but can we really expect such a paradig-
matic change within the next 20 years?
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2 Modernity and how innovation became entangled

in contradictions

About 50 years ago, and approximately 200 years after Immanuel Kant had laid
the foundation of (occidental) enlightenment, which itself must be seen as the
basis of modernity, Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno wrote the Dia-
lectic of Enlightenment (1968). They stated that the original ideas and intentions
of enlightenment (liberation of thinking from religious, metaphysical and
mythical commitments; autonomous human reason as the unique and ultimate
authority for self-determined acting; the belief in reason, rationality, and sci-
ence, and so on) are developing through a dialectical process that leads to an
ambiguous and contradictory development of rationality. This process of real-
isation, in their view, always has the potential to fall back into irrationality and
myth; therefore they conclude that there is no linear movement towards the aim
of higher levels of rationality (Horkheimer and Adorno 1968). This is mainly
because two types of rationality have prevailed: an instrumental reason of cal-
culating means and ends, and a rationality based on values. In their view
instrumental rationality has dominated almost all spheres of modernity.
Although this early critique was very elaborate and influential in sociology,
culture, and arts in general, it could not challenge the success of the modernity
process in general. If we refrain from the narrow field of critical social science,
until very recently the overall process of modernity was not under scrutiny. This
was mainly because modernity was in its core interpreted as an industrial
modernity, and the latter proved to work very well as an ‘‘engine of prosperity’’
creating affluence – and consent. This was evidently at the expense of the
exclusion of large parts of mankind and on the basis of the extensive waste of
resources.
Nevertheless, the promise of prosperity created an unchallenged belief in
progress, and advances along the growth and prosperity trajectory were guar-
anteed by innovation. Very prominent German top managers who are still
hopelessly biased in their belief in progress put it this way: ‘‘Innovation is the
living elixir of our society’’. The problem is that they think in terms of the
conventional type of modernity, which means that they still think in the simple
(and old) terms of modernity, ignoring the fact that the major premise under-
pinning the concept has lost ground.
Horkheimer’s and Adorno’s early scepticism concerning the process of
enlightenment is nowadays further advanced as a general critique of modernity,
and as such applies to many (all?) social spheres. This reorientation of critical
theory reflects real changes that were emerging in modern societies, particularly
in industrial modernity, since the 1970 s and which brought about a multitude of
contradictions grounded in the ecological, social and political domains. Within
the industrial societies the ecological problems were aggravating, social conflicts
were intensifying and political systems ran into legitimation crises – to mention
but the most prominent problems (Fig. 1 points out these challenges and relates
them to the future of modernity).
Another relevant external challenge was the success of supposedly traditional
(in Western understanding pre-modern) societies in initiating industrialisation
processes and in developing their own type of industrial modernity. This
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Fig. 1 Modernity at crossroads

demolishes the assumption many social scientists and economists take for
granted, that there is necessarily one single type of socio-cultural and religious
values which are – to say the least – favourable for industrial development and
for shaping a universal model of industrial modernity.
Both tendencies challenged simple modernity and called for a reconsideration
of the concept. The result, as witnessed in European sociology, philosophy, and
aesthetic theory, are two opposing strands of discussions: post-modernism and
reflexive modernity.
Since post-modernism abandons the foundations of modernity by rejecting
the claim of enlightenment, even when this claim is reflexively directed towards
modernity itself, it makes it difficult to discuss its challenge to industrial
modernity. Therefore I will stay with the concept of reflexive modernity, which
admittedly argues to a great extent normatively, but is more tightly connected to
social processes, in other words to industrial modernity.
The concept of reflexive modernity has been discussed broadly since the
beginning of the 1990s in European sociology (Giddens 1990; Lash 1990; Beck
et al. 1996). It questions conventional (or old) modernity in its political, social
and cultural dimensions. The main findings refer to universal processes like
globalisation, sustainable development, and sustainable democracy. The diag-
noses made can be summed up in the observation that the conventional (‘‘go
on!’’) modernisation ran into serious difficulties. The ecological and social crises
have seriously shaken some fundamental beliefs of modernity, such as the belief
in economic growth, the belief in the progress of (and with) technology as well as
the belief in the sciences’ monopoly on truth.
These beliefs, combined with the mistrust in the increasingly visible impossi-
bility of planning social, economic and innovation processes, indicate a general
loss of confidence in rationality as the unchallenged foundation of modernity.
This uneasiness is expressed in the remark that modernity – which in its self-
image is nothing but a generalised industrial modernity – can be characterised as
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the epoch of not intended side effects (Giddens 1984; Giddens 1990). Added to the
uncertainties produced at various levels of society (such as through the insta-
bility of social institutions; more on this in the following section) these argu-
ments serve as strong reasons for a transformation of the modernity to a new
level of reflexivity.
Without going into further detail it can be stated that this process is a self-
transformation, which means the liquidation of modernity and the constitution
of a reflexive modernity created through carrying out self-criticism and by
applying the instruments of modernity to modernity. This re-invention or re-
writing of modernity begins with the re-definition of the premise and assump-
tions, and ends up with a reconsideration of the goals.
Summing up and leading on to the more specific problem of innovation, I
want to state that if reflexivity means to subjugate its own premise and goals (to
‘‘modernise’’ them), then applying these ideas to innovation, the ‘‘elixir of the
industrial modernity’’, makes sense and is probably the only way out of the
current crisis of innovation in industrial societies. Therefore a reflexive innova-
tion, or the innovation of innovation is on the agenda. In the following section I
will develop some tentative ideas of what reflexive innovation might be. At this
stage it can already be revealed that the culture of manufacturing will play an
important role in this process.

3 Reflexive innovation, or: innovation of innovation

From the very beginning of capitalist production, and under the pressure to
constantly revolutionise the forces of production (in other words to innovate), it
has shown that innovation is a ‘‘risky business’’, particularly with regard to
external uncertainties (of markets for example). But nowadays the degree of
uncertainty related to innovation has reached a maximum, and – probably more
importantly – innovation itself has become an internal source of uncertainty.
This means that major uncertainties are nowadays produced by and during the
innovation processes themselves. I just want to state two very important points
regarding product design.
Firstly, there is uncertainty arising out of the contradiction between increased
planning and the danger that the intended goals (be it product innovation or an
organisational innovation) cannot be attained (either not at all or not within the
time and cost frames). Particularly since innovation is on a larger scale and the
whole process is spatially distributed (among various actors), the effort of
planning is increased, but deterministic planning is itself a source of uncertainty,
because it creates strong rigidity that does not allow sufficient flexibility.
Secondly, a considerable source of uncertainty is the lack of complete infor-
mation, which has led to an increase of not intended’ side effects. Following the
discussions on reflexive modernity I sketched in the preceding section, we might
say that the current situation is marked by the fact that a large number of the
innovations today have the function of coping with the unintended effects of
past innovations. In this respect it is worth mentioning that the increasing sig-
nificance of science in product innovation (buzzword ‘‘science based products’’)
have lulled us all into a false sense of security. Today, after several decades of
technology assessment, we know that in virtually no case the information for
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assessing the appropriateness of the products and its effects was complete, and
consequently the outcomes were unpredictable – if we look at large scale tech-
nology and its unpredictable social effects. But even if we focus on innovations
in the manufacturing industries, particularly the machine tool industry (which –
compared to atomic energy or chemical industry – is small scale technology), we
find that the appropriateness of products very often could not be achieved and
the social effects (like qualification, skill, organisation) were not sufficiently
anticipated.
Moreover there is a cluster of societal uncertainties; these revolve around the
question of whether or not the product innovation carried out within companies
or through inter-organisational networks will lead to socially, ecologically and
economically desirable products. This raises the political question of the inno-
vation goals, a question which clearly is at the core of reflexive innovation.
Last but not least, the globalisation tendency produces uncertainty and exerts
impact on innovation regarding the product differentiation and targeting
strategies. The spectrum of answers to this challenge varies between the product
differentiation á la Ford (i.e. producing the Model T in any colour the customer
wants – provided the colour is black) which means one product for the world, to
the other pole: regionally-adjusted customer-oriented product strategies (for
instance Levi’s selling pants with different, anatomically adjusted cuts in dif-
ferent parts of the world).
These sketched tendencies seem to indicate that the uncertainties of innova-
tion are not diminishing but rather increasing. This raises the question whether it
is time to re-define our understanding of innovation as well as the innovation
process itself. The suggestion I want to offer is to innovate on innovation – or in
the words of reflexive modernity, to make innovation reflexive. What this means
shall be expanded below.
In order to check whether innovation processes do serve the needs of societies
it is necessary to continuously assure ourselves of the appropriateness of the
underlying assumptions and to re-define them if necessary. The assumptions
underlying the modern innovation processes are:
1. Product innovation is a process which can be planned, so we have the pos-
sibility of an ex ante assessment of resources, time required and all effects.
2. The competence needed to carry out product innovation is located with
engineers.
3. Product innovation leads to good/better products.
These assumptions are linked to some general and specific innovation goals.
The general goals are summarised by the catchwords faster (innovation cycles),
more (product innovation) and larger (scale of product innovation). With regard
to specific goals of innovation in the manufacturing industries, particularly in
the manufacturing equipment industry, there was a long-lasting guiding idea of
humanless factory automation which was relieved by new concepts such as
HOMS (Human-Oriented Manufacturing Systems) or HCCIM (Human-Cen-
tred CIM).
The supposition that product innovation can be planned is an increasingly
doubtful assumption lacking in foundation. The reports on the planning failures
in product innovation are myriad (Ehrlenspiel 1993). This must be perceived as
a problem, which was already virulent in the times of traditional product
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innovation, and it will become more critical with more complex products, to-
gether with tighter ecological and social requirements. Therefore the goal of
having ever faster and shorter innovation cycles, which is nowadays often per-
ceived as an invariable inner momentum of innovation as such, need to be
reconsidered (Ruth 1996a).
Furthermore, the assumption that engineers are the innovation specialists is
questioned by the increasing involvement of different innovation actors. This is
already taking place in the traditional type of innovation, and a reflexive
innovation will have to develop this trend further. Firstly, product innovation
needs the input of many disciplines and knowledge and experience domains, and
secondly, the trend towards globalised concurrent innovation requires the
involvement of experts with different cultural backgrounds.2
Reflexive product innovation inevitably requires a fundamental reconsidera-
tion of the type and quality of products; this ‘‘modernisation’’ of goals will have
to go towards HOMS or HCCIM systems. New guiding images for manufac-
turing technology will emerge such as holonic organisational architectures
(Mathews 1996; Koestler 1967). These systems are assumed to be self-moni-
toring, self-managing and self-replicating techno-organisational manufacturing
systems. Another emerging role model with some potential for future manu-
facturing systems is bio-automation (Ueda and Vaario 1997) which, based
on ideas like self-growth, self-organisation and evolution, allows adaptations
to increase complexity in manufacturing (like the need for adaptation due to
changed requirements during the life-time of products or adaptations due to
regional/cultural conditions).
Last but not least, the need for appropriate (regionalised and culturally
adapted) products provides a major challenge for reflexive innovation. The
significance of this point is not only given by the experiences of technology
transfer between developed and developing countries through the last 30 years,
but also through the insight that the performance level of technical systems
depends on the contexts in which the systems are to be employed. These con-
textual backgrounds are shaped by skill formation systems, education systems,
economical and technological infrastructures, and social, culture and value
systems. One of the major tasks of reflexive innovation is to align the product
innovation process with the need for differentiated, regionally-adjusted prod-
ucts.
Table 1 is a synoptical overview of the sketched features that distinguish
traditional and reflexive innovation.
If the above illustrations roughly meet the point, then the innovation of
innovation ultimately requires the modernisation of innovation assumptions,
goals, and guiding images, which eventually will lead to an entire restructuring
of innovation processes in compliance with these re-definitions. The question
now arises as to how the innovation of innovation can take place? How can it be

2
This assumed general trend of innovation processes to become spatially distributed has its
clear limitations when networked processes with continuous collaboration between different
actors take place or when end-user involvement is intended, because this cooperation works
best when direct (face-to-face) communication is carried out. This is why a regional distribution
of innovation processes is advantageous against concepts of ‘‘globalised time-sharing telede-
sign’’. The latter at best are suitable as means for sub-contract based design but not for
participative innovation processes or for cross cultural dialogues between designers and users.
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Table 1 Main features of reflexive and traditional innovation

Criteria Traditional innovation Reflexive innovation

Premise Innovation is progress Progress through negotiated

innovation
Goals Faster, more and larger Socially and ecologically sustainable
goods and processes
Goal attainment Decisions forced by Social discourse
market pressure
Planning Deterministic Rejection of the planning myth;
only probabilities
Products Market demand Sustainability
Processes Sequential Recursive
Competencies Engineers contributing Compound of various actors’
exclusively specific contributions
Function of innovation ‘‘Living elixir’’ Allow a better life for more people
in society
Nature of innovation Uniform processes and Culturally adapted processes
products and products

promoted and which general conditions have to be taken for granted to shape
innovation in the way that the requirements outlined above can be ensured?
My answer is: by realisation of the principles of manufacturing culture and
industrial culture. Therefore I will develop some ideas on both culture concepts
and their consequences for product innovation.

4 Culture of manufacturing and the drift towards

the innovation of innovation

In accordance with the above mentioned demand to check and re-define the
assumptions and premise of innovation, I will develop some ideas of where
innovation needs renewal. The bases of the analyses are the twin concepts of
manufacturing culture and industrial culture.3 I will refer to the concepts after
outlining some changes in the general conditions for innovation.
If we take a closer look at the real processes of real industrial sectors, for
instance core manufacturing industries like mechanical engineering, we find that
they increasingly are under pressure from their customers, which is reflected in
new product qualities. A design based on a single target is not appropriate
anymore, the new requirements to be met simultaneously are design to cost, to
marketability, to manufacture, to ecology – to mention but the most prominent
ends. These demands meet with the increased expectations of the employees for
human-centred products and work processes, and taken together these form the
very demanding goal of sustainability which stands for ecological compatibility
and human-centredness of products and production processes.

3
For the purposes of this paper, and due to the fact that there is a large overlap in the content
of the two concepts, I will use the terms as synonyms. This clearly indicates the work to be done
in the future: checking the correspondence and differences, balancing and harmonising them in
order to develop a unified strong concept based on culture.
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To sum up briefly, it can be said that the innovation processes in the

mechanical engineering industries are being transformed from linear-consecutive
to integrated ‘‘networking’’ processes. These changes are very far-reaching and
result in more complex processes whose complexity is produced by the necessity
of taking into consideration many requirements simultaneously and by the
necessity to integrate an increasing number of different actors who specialise in
specific aspects of the innovation processes, both intra- and inter-organisational.
This changing structural setting can only be handled by increased effort to
improve communication and co-operation (Moritz and Ruth 1995). If this is
true, the success factors for innovation lie in the best formation of innovation
competence, which comprises different components like knowledge, skill, and
experience to be contributed by the various actors involved (Ruth 1997; Ruth
2001).
Before extending the discussion of innovation competence, I want to make
two short remarks on the above sketched idea of an ‘‘innovated innovation’’.
Above all it indicates that a reflexivity of innovation has started. As mentioned,
the question of new product qualities and their repercussions for the organisa-
tion of innovation processes are increasingly affecting companies. But in the
sense of a real innovation of innovation this process has to go further (in other
words to radicalise). The question of product quality has to be embedded in a
general concept of innovation goals. This is of course a matter of many dis-
course layers: a general societal debate on socially, ecologically, economically,
technologically and culturally desirable innovation goals. Evidently, finding a
consensus seems to be a difficult task because of the different perceptions and
different rationalities of the social actors (particularly regarding the assessment
of cost and benefits that the achievement of certain innovation goals might
bring).
The tendency towards parallelism instead of sequential innovation processes
is already taking place – as mentioned – but a reflexive innovation will go far
beyond by surmounting the underlying deterministic planning model of inno-
vation. A broad acceptance of the deficient opportunities for planning combined
with a denial of rule-based design processes will bring about new types of
process control, which are mainly based upon flexible networking of innovation
actors.
Another, not yet broadly developed field for ‘‘innovating innovation’’ is
the formation of competence, knowledge and qualification. Reflexive inno-
vation will define the innovation competencies from the perspective of the new
process requirements and therefore break up the demarcations that are so
typical for the conventional type of innovation (Ruth 1997). Instead of
accepting the involved actors as specialists for their specific knowledge
domains, future innovation requires the collaboration of experts. These
experts originate from various domains, like manufacturing (workers), engi-
neering design, psychology and sociology with different social, ethnic and
cultural backgrounds. The synthesis of shop floor experiences (such as
expertise on manufacturability) with traditional engineering expertise is pur-
sued nowadays – with varying success, since it requires practical competen-
cies like communicative abilities, which have not yet been developed on a
broad scale. Furthermore, the integration of engineering and social sciences is
not yet realised.
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A theoretical framework covering these integrations of knowledge and com-

petencies is provided by the concepts of innovation communities (Lynn et al.
1997) and design discourses (Ruth 2001). Innovation communities are concep-
tualised as ‘‘the functionally integrated and interdependent set of organisations
involved in commercialising a new technology’’ (Lynn et al. 1997). Innovation
communities cover networks of various organisations from universities, insti-
tutes, professional associations, government bodies, public interest groups, and
so on. These actors are distinguished in techno-economic substructure organi-
sations which ‘‘produce the innovation or technology’’, and superstructure
organisations which coordinate and manage the activities of substructure or-
ganisations. The linkages between the innovation communities approach and
the design discourse concept become quite evident at this point. A synthesis of
various innovation inputs must be managed; it is not emerging automatically
but rather needs active moderation: a superstructure activity. Although the
design discourse approach puts its attention on the technology-focused design
process (not explicitly on the commercialisation of innovations), the problems of
synthesising disparate knowledge and competencies, and of coordinating vari-
ous innovation actors and their activities, are similar to those addressed by the
innovation community concept. The solution favoured by the design discourse
approach, however, lies in strengthening these required functions (like coordi-
nation and management skills) among the substructure actors. To facilitate these
reinforcements a common ground for communication and co-operation has to
be established, which is a matter of language, trust, and approaching one
another.
I will develop this idea by sketching two recently developed transdisciplinary
conceptual attempts in innovation research to synthesise sociology and engi-
neering sciences: the culture of manufacturing and industrial culture.

4.1 The ‘‘industrial culture of manufacturing’’

The commonality of both concepts is their place at the contact space’ between
engineering and social sciences. The industrial culture approach crosses the still
very marked demarcation line from social science towards engineering science,
and the culture of manufacturing approach, conversely, crosses the border
coming from engineering to social sciences. A further tie between both concepts
lies in the fact that both applied their research approaches to the field of pro-
grammable automation, particularly CNC machine tool design, transfer and
use.
The industrial culture approach was – possibly more clearly than manufac-
turing culture – a research approach which aimed at analysing the design,
transfer and use of CNC technology within an internationally comparative
framework (Rauner and Ruth 1989). The research instruments comprise a
framework of social, psychological, institutional and cultural dimensions and
variables that are used for investigating national/industrial cultural differences
in machine tool design, transfer and use. Although the concept aims to reveal
the differences by making use of non-technical factors, it accepts – unlike the
majority of so-called social constructivist theories of technology development
(Bijker et al. 1987) – the existence of a technological core or a techno-logic which
is not subject to socio-cultural shaping. Therefore the realm of industrial
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culture-based technology design is beyond this inner core of techno-logic. De-

tails of the concept including methodological annotations are described in more
detail elsewhere (Rauner and Ruth 1990; Ruth 1995; Ruth 1996b).
The described use of the concept as a research tool is just one utilisation which
is labelled a micro application. The corresponding macro application of the
industrial culture approach pays attention to the processes of cross-cultural
learning, industrial cultural interferences and cross-cultural borrowings (Ruth
1995). These subjects are linked to the practice of shaping production concepts
and organisations or to technology design in cross cultural contexts. This more
practice-oriented macro dimension of industrial culture links it to the culture of
manufacturing.
The culture of manufacturing starts from the engineering practice and recent
and emerging trends in manufacturing (Ito 1997a; 1997b). Building on global-
ising trends in production, the manufacturing culture approach states that the
common belief in a general applicability of technological systems all over the
world is more and more undermined. Furthermore the hitherto guiding idea of
full (‘‘deserted’’) automation has lost its power of persuasion. The latter gave
rise to flexible, human intelligence based manufacturing which has to be adapted
to the prevailing preconditions of human resources, while the former requires
the design of regionally and culturally adapted equipment. Therefore the man-
ufacturing culture concept employs cultural, social, and psychological factors
for developing an appropriate understanding of the emerging diversity in
manufacturing technology development.
Industrial culture and manufacturing culture research has indicated that a
narrow technology-oriented approach to internationally comparative research
in technology development is insufficient. Both concepts have been successful in
developing building blocks of a culture-based theory of manufacturing tech-
nology design (Rauner 1997). This was only possible by synthesising knowledge
and concepts from the engineering and the social science domain (the method-
ology by and large was social science-based). Not least the concurrence of
industrial culture and manufacturing culture contributed to the border crossing
between engineering science and social science regarding research and concep-
tual collaboration. A desirable, and not yet accomplished, goal is the synthesis
of social science and engineering in the practice of technology design. In my view
the question of whether or not we succeed in synthesising ‘‘water and oil’’, as Ito
(1997a) paraphrased the problem, is decisive to the expectations of culture-based
manufacturing.
The following section will try to give some tentative answers based on
examples.

5 Expectations and challenges to culture-based

manufacturing: a tightrope walk

If the necessity of a culture-based manufacturing as well as a culture-based

theory of technology (design, transfer and use) is taken for granted – as this
paper wants to make clear – we have to assess the prospects of both ventures
now. As indicated in the above section on industrial culture and culture of
manufacturing research, these approaches have been rather successfully crossing
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the disciplinary boundaries but it is necessary to transform the trans-disciplinary

collaboration from contingency towards a systematic form of cooperation. This
might take place through cross-disciplinary borrowing of metaphors and se-
lected theoretical terms, which is taking place already (for example between
sociology and cognitive sciences/artificial intelligence, or sociology and biology),
but this is not sufficient because a deep mutual understanding of multi-disci-
plinary actors is necessary for a synthesis. A discourse on methodology seems
inevitable if a trans-disciplinary collaboration is to be realised. But a method-
ological discourse will only be successful (or feasible at all) if a common defi-
nition of the research subject is preceding. This delineation will not be
fragmented (developed out of disciplinary perspectives) but rather be developed
from the research object’s point of view. An approach like that takes Latour’s
(1993) idea seriously that the distinction between social and artificial, natural
and technical is an invented dichotomy that is inappropriate for the ‘‘hybrids’’
we face today. A comparatively simple version of a hybrid is a socio-technical
computer-based work system, but even this example shows that the recom-
mendations seem to get entangled in a vicious circle because the still prevailing
(communication) borders between the two cultures of natural sciences and
humanities – as C.P. Snow put it – can only be overcome by trying to do
collaborative research. Evidently this requires sociologists’ willingness to de-
velop a deeper understanding of technology (opening up the ‘‘black box’’) in the
first place, and engineers on the other side must move away from identifying the
social domain just as an unnecessary decoration (‘‘twaddle’’, as it is occasionally
termed).
For the methodological discourses to be initiated this means that sociology as
a reflecting science, and engineering as a constructive science, have to develop a
common methodological ground which allows for a co-operative approach into
technology design and research. Therefore the reflective science has to become
constructive, and the constructive science has to become reflective. Although
this general (and probably very na) proposal looks very symmetrical, the real
discourses might not be so well-balanced. But in any case these changes of
perspectives will impact the basic scientific and methodological concepts of both
sciences, which up to now constitute a specific division of labour and therefore a
fragmentation of the subject of research.
Traditionally sociology is chasing after facts or meaning in order to develop
explanations, either hypotheses or theories. In almost all cases this can only be
done retrospectively – ‘‘after the fact’’ – or after the constructive sciences have
done their traditionally assigned ‘‘job’’ which is creating facts and artefacts.
Although one might claim that sociology is also a constructive science – in the
meaning of a construction of social facts and artefacts – we have to consider the
differences between the construction of an idea, a theory or meaning, and
the construction of tangible artefacts. But once we have established a common
agenda for culture of manufacturing (and treat the above mentioned hybrids as
indivisible research subjects) this difference will possibly vanish.
Under these new circumstances, can we imagine what happens when we merge
ethnographic methods with engineering design methods, or action-based
research methods with methods of evaluating design solutions? What should be
pointed out here is that there is a large field of experimenting, and that there will
be an extensive search for new structures, methods and processes.
 237

At this stage two remarks need to be made. First, it is important to state that
sociology is not per se competent for culture in a narrower sense. If the culture
issue shall play a major role in culture-based theories of technology, other dis-
ciplines like anthropology need to be involved in the research ventures – but this
would not affect the significance of the above statements. Second, if culture-
based research in manufacturing and innovation establishes a new academic
field, as Ito expects (Ito 1997a; Ito 1997b) – and the above sketched arguments
on research subjects, methodology, and so on support this belief – the most
serious problem arising is how to harmonise the different research interests of
the various disciplines. The fundamental difference between humanities and
engineering sciences probably lies in the valuation of theory and practice, or
more specifically in the relationship between research results and their transla-
tion into technical artefacts or generally into practice. Whereas the engineering
sciences always feel the need for incorporating research outcomes into technical
artefacts, a goal which often triggers further research, the humanities on the
other side aim at analysing problems appropriately and generating hypotheses,
and beyond this they expect the practitioners to translate the results into practice
(evidently both types are idealised and there are always exceptions to the rule).
The latter remark leads us directly to the second item I want to address in
these concluding paragraphs: culture-based manufacturing as a matter of
practice.
The necessity for culture-based manufacturing and innovation results from
the sketched trends in innovation. A global product diversification, human-
centredness of production systems (HOMS) and the need for human-centred
technology arising from it, challenge traditional innovation and bring about
modernised innovation processes with varying sets of involved actors and ‘‘in-
dividualised’’ innovation courses. Aside from the involvement of various com-
pany actors (which was outlined in the section on innovation competence) a new
stage in design cooperation will be achieved by the inclusion of sociologists in
the product innovation processes. This modification is inevitable to accomplish
product innovation following the principles of industrial culture of manufactur-
ing, in other words culturally, socially and regionally accommodated products.
The sound assumption is that a collaboration of engineers and social scientists
will be the backbone to attain to the goal, but it is not sufficient because, as
mentioned above, sociologists are no experts on culture, nor are they stake-
holders for regional recipients of manufacturing technologies. Therefore the idea
of regionalized products (manufacturing technology) needs the involvement of
experts from within the targeted culture, region or social cluster. This will end up
with the institutionalisation of cross-cultural design discourses (involving varying
actor sets) in order to develop a ‘‘cultured technology’’.
Nonetheless, the collaboration between engineers and sociologists will play a
crucial role, and success will depend upon their mutual abilities to listen to and
learn from each other, which means to accept the others contribution as of the
same value as their own, and trying to understand the specific rationality of the
professional behaviour and the specific means and tools of the unfamiliar dis-
cipline. A rather noteworthy peculiarity of the majority of (particularly German)
sociologists is that they fear loosing their attribute of being critical scientists
once they are involved in shaping-oriented cooperation. The irony of this res-
ervation is that on the other hand many sociologists suffer from their deficiency
238

of practice (at least for certain parts of academic sociology such as industrial
sociology and organisational sociology). This might turn out to be a strong
practical barrier from the sociologists’ side.
Another more general obstacle to collaboration of engineers and sociologists
seems to be a mutual mistrust. The question is: how can trust relationships
between the actors be established? The answer: the best way is to involve them in
successful innovation processes. Evidently it is difficult to anticipate whether or
not a project will be a success, but as mentioned already, the uncertainties are
increasing all the time... so why not use any project? A very brief excursion into
a recent case that took place in Germany will serve as an example for both
learning and trust.
In the beginning of the 1990 s a (government funded) cross-disciplinary
project on computer and experience based work systems was carried out in
Germany (see, for example, Mertens et al. 1993). In the beginning, collaboration
between social scientists (and psychologists), and engineers was difficult, because
there were different self- and role-understandings that had to be overcome.
There were different ideas of the appropriate methods to find out user appro-
priateness: The engineers wanted to make prototypes and let users test them, but
sociologists first wanted to interview the end users to find out their wishes before
starting design work (and also to develop a sophisticated methodological tool
set for cross checking). Eventually, a participative procedure including the real
end users (with stepwise feedback) was established by initiating a discourse on
methods, which lead to a higher trust level among engineers and social scientists,
as well as to mutual learning (mainly based on methods).
This example might also show that neither engineers nor social scientists are
experts on human-centredness, so the potential users have to be involved in the
design discourses; similarly with regionally and culturally accommodated
products.

6 Conclusion: some prospects for culture

of manufacturing

A first general conclusion to be drawn here is that a culture of manufacturing

approach in innovation requires the surmounting of the separation between
social and technical – in accordance with B. Latour’s concept of hybrids. Setting
up manufacturing culture as a new research and development field itself will
contribute to overcoming this separation.
Secondly, if during collaborative innovation processes it is possible to insti-
tutionalise a change of perspectives among the involved disciplines, the likeliness
of successful innovation is highest.
Third, the collaboration between sociology and engineering needs to be
symmetric in nature: in other words it must be based upon mutual trust,
transdisciplinary learning and border crossing between disciplines. The latter
means that the general concepts and ideas of unfamiliar disciplines will be ac-
quired; evidently this cannot go too far because, it cannot be expected that all
engineers make extensive studies in sociology and vice versa. Not least this
would make the collaboration obsolete!
 239

Regarding project management and collaboration during technology design

processes, the idea of symmetric co-operation means that there will be no ‘‘junior
partners’’ playing only a minor role with limited responsibility.
The stated attributes of culture-based manufacturing refer to the idea of a
tightrope walk: with regard to learning, trust and crossing disciplinary borders,
there is always a balance needed, not too little and not too much – and every-
where failure is looking for an opportunity to strike!
Reconsidering the title of this paper, the question of whether socioneering or
enginology is more appropriate is of secondary importance if it is clear that the
synthesis of the two disciplines in question is always an inter-subjective one. In
other words, even if the twin concepts of industrial and manufacturing culture
constitute a new academic field, we will refrain from devising it as a discipline
that can be studied at university, but rather let the different disciplinary roots
prevail and enable the discourses between the disciplines (and cultures) by fos-
tering the individuals’ border crossing discourses and learning capabilities.

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