By Anya O Anya

Being excerpts of a keynote address in honour of Professor A.O.E Animalu, at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, recently

FROM the mid-17th century to the yearly 19th century the protestant reformation had created an environment where new ideas could sprout and flourish. The German sociologist (Max Weber) had promoted the idea that the protestant ethic had catalyzed the emergence of the spirit of capitalism not by inventing the pursuit of wealth, but rather by defining and promoting an ethics of everyday behaviour that conduce to economic success.

Calvinist Protestantism is derived from the idea of predestination which morphed into a secular code of behaviour and proper thoughts and promoted the pursuit of the values of hard work, honesty, seriousness and the thrifty use of money and time. These values promoted business and the accumulation of capital. Although the good Calvinist did not aim for riches (even when he might believe that honest riches was a divine favour), he aimed to live and work in a certain way. It was the way that mattered and riches became at best a by-product of that kind of life. 

Additionally, the sociologist Robert K. Merton argued that there is a direct link between Protestantism and the rise of modern science. Whether in the pursuit of capitalism or the emergence of modern science the protestant ethic, the heart of the matter lies in the promotion of a new man: rational, ordered, diligent and productive hence, Calvinist Protestantism implanted these virtues among its believers who judged one another by the level of conformity to these standards. As Weber pointed out, people of all faiths and even of no faith can grow up to be rational, diligent, orderly, productive, clean and humourless as these patterns can be seen in all walks of life. According to him, in the 16th -18th century we observed the emergence of certain types who created a new mode of economy and a new mode of production which we have now termed industrial capitalism.

Science, technology and the industrial revolution: With the emergence of capitalism and its hand maiden science, the stage was now set to exploit the methodologies inherent in both the methods of science and the drivers of capitalism. Of particular interest was what we now recognize as the scientific method. In this schema, a method of procedure which has characterized natural science since the 17th century emerges consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiments leading to the formulation, testing and eventually the modification of a hypothesis.

As it has been noted, criticism is the backbone of the scientific method. Albeit, there are six interlinked steps in the operation of the scientific method, namely: •Asking a question arising from observation; •Doing background research to learn what is already known about the subject;• Constructing a hypothesis to explain what has been observed; •Experimenting to test the hypothesis; •Analyzing the data from the experiment and drawing conclusions; •Communicating the results to other scientists. Operationalizing the results of the scientific methods leads to the new ways that the data can be utilized or used and applied in the solution and strategies to realize the results through practical application to solve the problem now embodied as technology.

The systematic application of technology to solve extant problems in the 1830s, to 1840s in Great Britain gave rise to the industrial revolution. This was, therefore, a period when scientific and technological development in the 18th century transformed rural and agrarian societies into industrial urban centres. This first industrial revolution was followed by three new subsequent phases which other sequels inaugurated as industrial revolutions. The first industrial revolution started in Britain in the 1830s to the 1840s but soon spread to the rest of Europe and the United States. Most impacted were the textile industries. Goods that before then were painstakingly crafted by hand started to be produced in mass by machines in factories engineered by the new iron industries. The entry of the steam engine was critical as it became useful in the flour, paper and cotton mills as well as in such infrastructure as water works, canals and the railroads where it engineered the transformation of transportation.

The second industrial revolution was a phase of rapid scientific discovery, standardization, mass production and industrialization from the late 19th century into the early 20th century. Ground breaking advances in manufacturing technology and industrial production methods include the telegraph, especially in Britain, United States and Germany. Among the many inventions of the third industrial revolution, three inventions standout: fibre optics, the transistor and mass production with new materials, alloys and chemicals. This marked the emergence of material sciences as a discipline. Taken together, the communication technologies (the telegraph, telephone and radio) led to faster transmission of news and new ideas which packaged as general information became more democratized and accessible. Indeed, information technologies have experienced massive increases in capabilities and decreasing costs for years now.

  We are in the period of big bang disruption driven by the latest in soft-ware, memory, and communication which tends to be mainstream, high quality, very innovative and at lower cost: cell phones have displaced photo cameras, day timers, video cameras, watches, maps auto GPS system, music players and more. The fourth industrial revolution conceptualizes rapid change to technology, industries and societal patterns and processes in the 21st century. It is a new chapter in human development, enabled by extraordinary advancement in technology commensurate with those of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd industrial revolutions: it enforces on us the need to re-think how countries develop, how organizations create value and even what it means to be human, given the emergence of AI(Artificial Intelligence).

Science, technology and the process of development: It is usual to hear people discuss the state of nations as developed, developing or in a state of under-development. National Development refers to the ability of a nation to improve the lives of its citizens. The measure of improvement may be material such as an increase in the gross domestic product, GDP, or social capital such as literacy rates and the availability of health care. Economic development is the long-term process of building an array of inter-dependent micro-economic capabilities and incentives to support more advanced forms of competition. In general, the success of any effort at economic development requires sustained improvement in the quality and specialization of a nation’s factor inputs.

Thus, for a nation to move beyond poverty it must upgrade its input, institutions and skills to allow more sophisticated forms of competition. Such competitions often lead to increased productivity and the increase in productivity usually entails upgrading human capital, improving infrastructure, opening up for international trade and foreign investment, protecting intellectual property and generally raising regulatory standards to drive improvements in product quality. Indeed, the most basic belief under-girding successful economic development is the acceptance that prosperity depends on productivity rather than the control of resources, government favours, or military power. 

To be concluded

Professor Anya is a multi-dimensional personality, statesman, scientist and boardroom guru.