Document Type
Article
Publication Date
4-1994
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Abstract
The relatively stable contribution of technological change to aggregate growth masks technological trajectories which are, at the sectoral level, often highly discontinuous. For decades, even centuries, the capabilities used to produce a particular good or service may continue essentially unchanged or with relatively minor evolutionary modifications. Sometimes without much warning a breakthrough innovation will create a new technological paradigm, along with an accompanying "gale of creative destruction," which is then followed by a period of consolidation within a maturing framework.
Recommended Citation
Field, Alexander J. 1994. "French Optical Telegraphy, 1793-1855: Hardware, Software, Administration," Technology and Culture 35 (April 1994): 315-47.
Comments
Copyright © 1994 Society for the History of Technology. This article first appeared in Technology and Culture 35:2(1994), 315-347. Reprinted with permission by Johns Hopkins University Press.