The Standardization of Time: A Sociohistorical Perspective

Abstract

In order to clarify the fundamental distinction between the psychological and sociological perspectives on temporality, this paper explores the distinctly social process of establishing a standard time-reckoning framework. The paper examines the introduction of Greenwich Mean Time to Britain, the establishment of the American railway time-zone system, and the almost universal enforcement of the modern international standard-time zone system. The rise of standard time is viewed within the context of (a) the establishment of national and international communication networks following the introduction of railway transportation and telegraphic communication (which explains the need to synchronize different communities and countries with one another) and (b) the rise of rationalism (which is responsible for the dissociation of standard time from nature). The paper also examines the various grounds on which standard time has been opposed, as well as the relevance of the time-zone system to the development of modern Western "organic" ties of interdependence and complementary differentiation.