The Turpin affair and invention policy in late 19th century France

The late 19th century is sometimes considered the emerging moment of an invention policy based either on the beginnings of the internalisation of R&D in large companies or on mechanisms aimed at assessing the proposals of individual inventors. Inspired by some contributions of pragmatic sociology, this article interprets this phenomenon as the result of a politicisation of inventions. The Turpin affair, which broke out in the early 1890s around the invention of a powerful explosive, is one of its most emblematic forms, echoing the Dreyfus affair which broke out shortly afterwards.