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ENGINEERING IN AN INCREASINGLY COMPLEX SOCIETY 81 Engineering in an Increasingly Complex Society Historical Perspectives on Education, Practice, and Adaptation in American Engineering A Report Prepared by Arthur L. Donovan Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University for the Panel on Engineering Interactions With Society This report attempts to provide a preliminary yet comprehensive overview of engineering as a social and cultural activity. It draws on historical studies presented at a conference sponsored by the National Research Council: Engineering Interactions With Society: Issues, Challenges, and Responses in the History of Professional Engineering and Engineering Education, held in Washington, D.C., July 19â21, 1983. The report begins by characterizing engineering in three ways: as a distinctive type of knowledge, as a profession, and as a social practice. Three types of adaptation in engineering are then considered through a review of representative cases. The first type involves the interaction of science and engineering, the second the response to technological innovation, the third the influence of institutional factors. The report then examines the relationship between engineering and management and the implications this relationship has for engineering education. The final section of the report reviews selected historical cases of potential crisis in the engineering manpower supply system and the ways in which engineers present their work and their profession to themselves and the general public.
