Technocracy began as a 1930s engineers’ craze that lost its momentum within months
Hook
In the winter of 1932-33 an engineer promised a world run in units of energy instead of money. Membership may have reached a quarter of a million. Then a radio speech fell flat.
Claim
The word “technocracy” has a specific history, and it is not a flattering one.
From American Heritage:
- Howard Scott led the Technical Alliance, which surveyed North American industry measuring things in energy units rather than dollars (sources give different founding dates around 1918 to 1921).
- His idea: replace money with energy certificates, equal to the nation’s annual energy use, distributed equally to citizens and worthless if not used within the year, so capital could not pile up. Engineers would take the profit motive out of business.
- Harold Loeb popularised it; his early 1933 book claimed people would need to work “four hours or so, four days a week”. Columbia engineering professor Walter Rautenstrauch shared the view that engineers should run things, though he doubted some of Scott’s theories.
- Clubs formed in the winter of 1932-33, with unemployment at least 25%. Membership “may have numbered as many as a quarter-million” in early 1933.
- 13 January 1933: Scott’s speech at the Hotel Pierre, broadcast nationwide, offered mostly predictions of worse times and a warning against what he called “an institutional fascism”. It was mocked in Congress as “the great Columbia rackety-rax”. Columbia’s president and a professor distanced the university from it.
- The movement lost momentum within months. Clubs continued, and even grew, until the Second World War, but “the steam had gone out”.
American Heritage notes that Scott’s best-known engineering job, a nitrates project at Muscle Shoals, was criticised by a postwar investigation for “gross waste, inefficiency, and shoddy workmanship”.
What this does not show: that all expert-led government fails. It shows that a movement claiming expert authority, with no way for citizens to check it, can lose its credibility fast.
Story
Howard Scott gave one nationally broadcast speech at a New York hotel and was mocked within days. A plan that was meant to prove expertise showed instead that it had no way of testing itself.
Sources
- American Heritage, Howard Scott and his technocratic utopia: https://www.americanheritage.com/howard-scott-and-his-technocratic-utopia
Check before posting
- Founding dates of the Technical Alliance and Technocracy Inc. are not in American Heritage; do not give a single year.
- The split into Loeb’s Continental Committee and Scott’s Technocracy Inc. is not in American Heritage; find a second source before using it.
Counterargument
The 1930s movement is a weak guide to later expert institutions, which are bound by law and review. Judging all technocracy by Howard Scott is like judging all medicine by a famous quack.
Post angles
Facebook (Croatian) Riječ “tehnokracija” ima neobičnu povijest. Početkom 1930-ih inženjer Howard Scott predložio je da novac zamijene energetski certifikati, a da gospodarstvo vode inženjeri. U zimu 1932./33. imao je možda i četvrt milijuna članova. Onda je održao govor preko radija koji nije rekao ništa konkretno, i pokret je brzo izgubio snagu. Stručnost koju nitko ne može provjeriti nije stručnost, nego obećanje.
LinkedIn (English) The word “technocracy” started with Howard Scott and the engineers of the early 1930s, who proposed replacing money with energy certificates and having engineers run the economy. By early 1933 membership may have reached a quarter of a million. A nationally broadcast speech in January offered predictions but little plan, and the movement lost its momentum. Expertise that citizens cannot check is only a claim.
Links
Technocracy for the people means experts whom citizens can check