The neotechnic phase he saw was dominated by men of science, rather than mechanically apt machinists.

Mumford divides the development of technology into three overlapping phases: eotechnic, paleotechnic and neotechnic.

Compact and lightweight aluminum is the metal of the neotechnic, and communication and information-even inflated amounts-he claimed was the coin.

Like Mumford, Abbott was hopeful that, through urban planning efforts (aided by her photographs), Americans would be able to wrest control of their cities from paleotechnic forces, and bring about what Mumford described as a more humane and human-scaled, "neotechnic era".

In describing the neotechnic age (from about 1900 to Mumford's present, 1930), he focuses on the invention of electricity, freeing the factory production line from the restrictions of coal through the addition of small electric motors to individual machines, and freeing the laborer to create small but competitive factories.