Modellen van onderzoek. De oprichting van TNO, 1920-1940

Abstract

This article investigates the establishment of tno (Applied Science in the Netherlands), a Dutch research organization intended to boost industrial development. The article opens an integrated perspective on research laboratories. The early history of tno is typically understood as a story of government: particularly the ministry of Economic Affairs, which was responsible for industry policy, is supposed to have obstructed science. This article designs a typology of research laboratories that sheds new light on this story. In this perspective, the ministry did not play an obstructive role but preferred a different model of organizing research than tno. tno itself, moreover, consisted of diffuse models of research combining different characteristics.