Business, Education, the Environment, and Other Issues.

This chapter reviews elements of the study that are not central to the particular technologies studied, but that nonetheless affect both the development and the efficacy of micromanufacturing. Facets of the educational systems, business potentials and practices, governmental policies, and cultural characteristics in all of the countries visited drive and/or enable the technological development necessary for moving micromanufacturing forward. While this chapter makes some effort to compare the U.S. with other countries on these issues, readers can easily conduct similar comparisons from their own perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]