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SETTING THE STANDARD
s
tandards have accompanied human progress since time
immemorial and a more recent definition of standardisation, with respect to
technical standards, is that standardisation itself is theprocessof implementinganddeveloping
technical standards.¹ In consideration of technical standards, the industrial revolution,
particularly in Britain, resulted in many innovations and de facto standards that became
generally accepted on a national and sometimes international basis. For instance, Whitworth
developed the first unofficial national standard for screw threads (BSW) in 1841² and Kelvin
introduced accurate methods and apparatus for the measurement of electricity in 1857.³
The first standards organisation, the Engineering
Standards Committee, was set up in London in 1901
and it was not until towards the end of the First
World War that national standards committees
were established in Germany (1917), France
(1918) and the USA (1918). The first international
organisation, the International Organization
for Standardization (ISO), was formed in 1947
following a meeting in London in 1946 which
was attended by 64 delegates from 25 countries.
4
Its
formation was almost coincidental with that of IIW,
which was officially formed a year later in 1948.
IIW’s Constitution was to include reference to ISO.
One of the three main objectives in the Constitution, upheld at the first
Governing Council meeting on 11 June 1948, was to assist in the formulation
of international standards for welding in collaboration with ISO.
5
There was some antipathy, initially, between France and the UK, since the latter had
been awarded the first General Secretariat, with Mr Guy Parsloe as the General Secretary for
a non-specific period of tenure in accordance with IIW’s Constitution. Some deft negotiating
took place behind the scenes with France gaining increased status and technical control
through the appointment of Mr André Leroy as the Scientific and Technical Secretary of
IIW in 1950 at the IIW Annual Assembly in Paris. The French delegation withdrew its
objections to Parsloe’s period of tenure in the constitution and was happy for Leroy, the
André Leroy