4. Conclusion

The socio-history of French engineers and their training is strongly rooted in the Ancien Régime up to the pivotal period between the 19th and 20th centuries. This anchorage refers as much to their position and role in society as to their modes of thought and action. This period was marked by the profound link engineers forged between their activities, designed to serve technical progress, and social concerns (improving human well-being). It was also a period marked by military and mathematical order, accompanied by the consecration of the physical sciences as the foundation of engineering activity.

In the 19th century, industrial science, understood as a globalizing technology for business or as applied industrial research, sought to legitimize the productive organizational work carried out by engineers in industrial companies. This new mode of organization went...