ABSTRACT
In 1946, the eminent American sociologist William Fielding Ogburn published The Social Effects of Aviation, an early systematic attempt at technological and social forecasting, looking at the ways through which aviation would impact on social change in a number of areas, from leisure and family life to population, cities and international relations. Ogburn’s specific predictions are not an issue here, and they have been proven flawed in many respects (Richter 1991). For instance, based on contemporary predictions about the spread of automobility, Ogburn confidently stated that aviation would lead to a drop in the rate of population growth, because families would put the ownership and operation of personal aircraft ahead of procreation. In part, this early vision of generalized aeromobility was clearly linked with efforts towards producing a ‘poor man’s aeroplane’, spearheaded in the 1930s by Eugene Vidal at the helm of the Bureau of Air Commerce in the USA. The $700 aircraft would cost the same as a nice car and would put aeromobility within the reach of hundreds of thousands of American families (Moore 2006).
