Gatejel, Luminita (2018) Building a Better Passage to the Sea Engineering and River Management at the Mouth of the Danube, 1829-61. TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE, 59 (4). pp. 925-953. ISSN 0040-165X, 1097-3729
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
This article deals with the first regulation project in the Danube Delta conducted by the European Commission of the Danube (ECD), one of the first international organizations in Europe. It looks at the ECD as a collective actor that planned and oversaw an infrastructural project under the auspices of the European Great Powers. In the name of free trade, the commissioners were able to overcome imperial rivalries and foster cooperation between diplomats and technical experts, thus shaping the collective identity of the commission. Hydraulic engineers acted as mediators in this system by adapting their formal knowledge to the political situation of the commission and to the complex environmental conditions at the mouth of the Danube. In this context, I argue that the regulation of the Danube Delta captures the evolution of the engineering knowledge at a point of transition between premodern river engineering and (high) modernist engineering projects. First, engineers rejected previous local practices of river management and relied exclusively on their own observations. And second, they did not try to contain nature's power but rather adapt their constructions to the agency of the river.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | ; |
| Subjects: | 300 Social sciences > 320 Political science 900 History & geography > 940 General history of Europe |
| Divisions: | Central Institutions > Wissenschaftszentrum Ost- und Südosteuropa Regensburg |
| Depositing User: | Dr. Gernot Deinzer |
| Date Deposited: | 05 Dec 2019 14:25 |
| Last Modified: | 05 Dec 2019 14:27 |
| URI: | https://pred.uni-regensburg.de/id/eprint/13725 |
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