Society

The paper analyses the successes and failures of the transfer of technical innovations into the Dutch construction industry. When in the nineteen-seventies calcium silicate stone was introduced as the basis for a new construction technology, it rapidly became the material of choice for housing construction in The Netherlands. More recently the Dutch government has been promoting timber frame construction as a sustainable alternative to conventional construction methods. The adoption of this method by the industry, however, is slow. The paper argues that differences in technology transfer practices in both sectors account for the differences in their relative success. It views technology transfer as a result of alignment processes between technical configuration and social effects; or, in other words, between form and function of a technology. Alignment, then, is not a purely technical matter. It involves tension and interaction between insiders and outsiders of a network; between those who develop, those who build, those who regulate, and those who use a technology. By describing and analysing these processes of alignment in the timber frame and calcium silicate stone construction sectors in the Netherlands, the paper aims to understand to what extent the adoption of construction methods can be anticipated and how it might be advanced