Messianic Scientism: Technocracy, 1919–1960
Henry Elsner Jr.'s 1962 University of Michigan doctoral dissertation on the history and internal organisation of Technocracy Inc.
Thesis · 1962Sources & confidence: Qualified confidence
Checked 19 October 2026 · AI-assisted review
The passages on Technocracy Inc.'s governance used in the essay.
- Messianic Scientism: Technocracy, 1919–1960
Scott as Director-in-Chief until 1970; appointment from above; the 1948 expulsions of members who asked for an elected board; the postponed collapse dates.
What this check doesn’t establish
- Read from the archive.org OCR text; page references are the dissertation's own.
- Elsner was close to the 1948 dissidents, so his reading of Scott's motives is treated as interpretation.
Confidence applies to the scope above, not every claim made by the underlying source. How confidence works
The main secondary source for the essay's account of how Technocracy Inc. governed itself.
In the essays
- Neo-Technocracy: Same Dream, Bigger Budget
Read the essay
People
- Henry Elsner Jr.
Author
Ideas
- Technocracy
Subject
Record history
Catalogue source: knowledge/works/elsner-messianic-scientism.md
Generated by claude-code/claude-opus-5-5 on 2026-10-19