NA TURE 



275 



THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1914. 



THE PLACE OF SCIENCE IN INDUSTRY. 



AN interesting article, by Mr. W. H. Dawson, 

 appears in the November number of the 

 Fortnightly Revieiv, under the heading "The 

 Campaign against German Trade." It is there 

 given as the opinion of one of " the six best known 

 industrial leaders of Germany" that "England's 

 days as an industrial country are over. Your 

 industry will pass more and more into the hands 

 of the younger nations, and you will become 

 simply a trading country." The author of the 

 article goes on to point out that the lesson of 

 Germany's success will not be learned "if we 

 refuse to grasp the fact that its people have 

 brought to industrial and trading pursuits just the 

 same habits of method, thoroughness, concentra- 

 tion, and seriousness which mark them in other 

 departments of life." He attributes the success 

 largely to the co-operation between science and 

 industry which prevails in Germany. This cannot 

 be denied; but a further reason for Germany's 

 rivalry, so far as it is successful, is afforded by 

 a quotation from a speech made in July, 191 2, by 

 the Prussian Minister of Commerce ; it is that the 

 desire of manufacturers is, without exception, 

 that the import duties on competitive articles may 

 be kept as high as possible, and the foreign duties 

 on articles exported from Germany as low as 

 possible. It is also emphasised by the writer of 

 the article that German employers have never had 

 to encounter systematic opposition on the part of 

 the workers, as has so often been the case in 

 this country. Again, the German cultivates 

 methods of distribution much more sedulously 

 than does the Englishman ; he never forgets that 

 he exists for his customers ; and the larger firms, 

 or combinations of them, keep highly paid agents 

 in every important market. The Germans are 

 also greatly aided by their banks, which advance 

 money on the security of orders. 



Mr. Dawson does not believe that changes in 

 fiscal regulations alone would put the British 

 manufacturers in the same favourable position as 

 the German, although he does not deny the ad- 

 vantages of a protective tariff. British trade 

 must be supported by foundations of brains, 

 science, and education, if it is to succeed. 



While the truth of the general scojje of the 



article, of which an abstract has been given, 



cannot be denied, it appears doubtful whether 



British manufacturers would care to adopt all the 



NO. 2350, VOL. 94] 



methods of their competitors. The colour trade, 

 to take an example, has been secured for Ger- 

 many, not entirely by the training of the chemists 

 and operatives, but by what the Germans some- 

 \yhat indefinitely call " Kultur " — careful organisa- 

 tion. First, the management consists, not in a 

 board of well-meaning elderly gien^men with a 

 works-manager in their employment, but in a 

 board of specialists, whose business in life is to 

 manage the factorv', financially, chemically, and 

 as engineers, and who are very highly paid for 

 their services. Second, these gentlemen and a 

 special staff are continuously on the look-out for 

 any scientific discovery or invention (generally 

 made in countries other than Germany) which can 

 prove of advantage to their business. Third, a 

 very large staff of men, trained in universities 

 or in technical schools, is turned on to the 

 problem of making such a discovery commercial, 

 whether by securing cheap raw material, cheapen- 

 ing the process of manufacture, or creating a 

 public demand for the article to be manufactured. 

 Fourth, a legal staff is maintained, whose busi- 

 ness it is to protect by patent all improvements, 

 however apparently trivial, and to describe them 

 so vaguely as to conceal them from their com- 

 petitors ; also to advise on means to crush com- 

 petitors by expensive legal actions. Fifth, such 

 companies are so powerful, that they can influence 

 the central Government to protect all new develop- 

 ments, whether by imposing duties on articles 

 which might possibly compete, by extending 

 bounties to all exported products, or by securing 

 advantages in freights to the coast, and in 

 shipping the goods abroad. These gentlemen in 

 some cases (not in all) have also to advise whether 

 piracy is likely to be successful ; whether it may 

 not be possible, by infringing a patent, so to 

 saddle an opponent \vith legal expenses as to 

 break his competition. Sixth and last, agen- 

 cies are maintained all over the world whereby 

 the article is introduced to the notice of foreign 

 purchasers, and an extensive credit system is 

 encouraged. 



Trade, in fact, is regarded in Germany as a 

 war, in which all means of conquest are permis- 

 sible. \\'e are at present discovering, in the 

 military Ojjerations of the Germans, the precise 

 equivalent in war of their operations in trade. 

 It remains to be seen whether we shall care to 

 do business with them when a state of industn.' 

 succeeds a state of war. If we are to conquer, 

 we have the alternatives ; to copy their methods ; 

 or to refuse to deal with them. Perhaps these 



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