A Brief Introduction To The Technocracy Movement

The technocracy movement is a social movement which arose in the early 20th century. Technocracy was popular in the United States and Canada for a brief period in the early 1930s, before it was overshadowed by other proposals for dealing with the crisis of the Great Depression. The technocrats proposed replacing politicians and businesspeople with scientists and engineers who had the technical expertise to manage the economy.

The movement was committed to abstaining from all revolutionary and political activities. The movement gained strength in 1930s but in 1940, due to an alleged initial opposition to the Second World War, was banned in Canada. The ban was lifted in 1943 when it was apparent that 'Technocracy Inc. was committed to the war effort, proposing a program of total conscription.' The movement continued to expand during the remainder of the war and new sections were formed in Ontario and the Maritime Provinces.

In the post-war years, perhaps due to continued prosperity, membership and interest in Technocracy decreased. Though now relatively insignificant the Technocracy movement alone among the collection of radical movements of the 1930s survives into the present day, publishing a newsletter, maintaining a website, and holding member meetings.

The technocratic movement has its origins with the progressive engineers of the early twentieth century and the writings of Edward Bellamy, along with some of the later works of Thorstein Veblen such as Engineers And The Price System written in 1921. William H. Smyth, a Californian engineer, invented the word "technocracy" in 1919 to describe "the rule of the people made effective through the agency of their servants, the scientists and engineers", and in the 1920s it was used to describe the works of Thorstein Veblen.

Early technocratic organizations formed after the First World War. These included Henry Gantt’s "The New Machine" and Veblen’s "Soviet of Technicians". These organizations folded after a short time. Writers such as Henry Gannt, Thorstein Veblen, and Howard Scott suggested that businessmen were incapable of reforming their industries in the public interest and that control of industry should thus be given to engineers.