IP: DEMOCRATIZING SCIENCE (in _Science_ magazine!):

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

Date: Wed, 04 Mar 1998 14:53:30 -0500 (EST)
From: Richard Sclove <resclove () amherst edu>


                                    Loka Alert 5:2 (4 March 1998)


Please Repost Widely
Where Appropriate




           DEMOCRATIZING POST-COLD WAR SCIENCE POLICY:


                      Action Opportunities!


      (Editorial from _Science_ Magazine by Richard Sclove)




Friends and Colleagues:


      This is one in an occasional series of electronic postings
on democratic politics of science and technology, issued by the
nonprofit Loka Institute.  Below is an editorial about
democratizing U.S. science policy that I have just published in
_Science_ magazine (27 Feb. issue).  It is followed by some
suggested easy steps you can take right now to promote post-Cold
War science and technology policies that are more socially
responsive and responsible.  There's a political opportunity
here; let's work together to use it!


     If you would like to be added to, or removed from, the Loka
Institute's E-mail list, please send a message to:
<Loka () amherst edu>.  Please invite interested friends and
colleagues to subscribe too.  Thank you!


--Dick Sclove 
  Executive Director
  The Loka Institute, P.O. Box 355, Amherst, MA 01004-0355 USA
  E-mail: resclove () amherst edu
  World Wide Web:  http://www.amherst.edu/~loka


  ** PLEASE NOTE THE LOKA INSTITUTE'S NEW PHONE & FAX NUMBERS **


         Tel. +(413) 559-5860; Fax +(413) 559-5811


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CONTENTS


(1) Introduction................................... (12 lines)
(2) "Better Approaches to Science Policy" 
       (Loka Editorial in _Science_ magazine)...... (1-1/2 pages)
(3) What You Can Do................................ (1 page)
(4) About the Loka Institute....................... (7 lines)


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               BETTER APPROACHES TO SCIENCE POLICY


                       by Richard E. Sclove


(1) INTRODUCTION


     The venue for the editorial that follows unusual:
_Science_ magazine is the leading professional science
journal published in the United States, and it publishes only one
editorial per issue.  I take the fact that _Science_ made the
unusual decision to publish an editorial calling for more social
responsiveness in science policymaking as a hopeful sign.  A 
post-Cold War thaw may finally be starting in U.S. science and
technology institutions.


     On the other hand, the thaw after a long freeze can produce
a sulfurous swamp, lifeless hardpan, or a blooming meadow.  After
the editorial I list a few steps you can take right now to help
get those flowers blooming!


*****************************************************************


     [The editorial that follows is reprinted with permission
from _Science_ magazine, Volume 279, Number 5355, Issue of 27
February 1998, p. 1283.  Copyright 1998 by The American
Association for the Advancement of Science.  Readers may view,
browse, and/or download this material for temporary copying
purposes only, provided these uses are for noncommercial personal
purposes.  Except as provided by law, this material may not be


further reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, adapted,
performed, displayed, published, or sold in whole or in part,
without prior written permission from AAAS.]




(2) BETTER APPROACHES TO SCIENCE POLICY, by Richard E. Sclove


     Who should sit at the table when science policy is being
decided?  Across the higher echelons of U.S. government, the
long-standing norm is to invite scientific leaders, but no one
else who will be affected or who might have an illuminating
alternative perspective.


     For example, to help frame a year-long effort to develop a
post-Cold War U.S. science policy, the House Science Committee on
23 October convened an elite group: the presidents of the
National Academies of Science and Engineering, representatives
from the Council on Competitiveness, leaders of the Sandia and
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories, the president of MIT,
and so on.  Notably absent were any representatives from the many
grassroots, worker, and public-interest organizations concerned
with science policy. There were no social scholars of science, no
proponents of alternative science policies (from within the
science community or without), and only a solitary science policy
critic.


     This event's restricted roster was hardly anomalous.  For
example, in 1992 and 1993--when Democrats controlled Congress--
the House Science Committee organized 30 hearings on a
comprehensive National Competitiveness Act.  Among 120 invited
witnesses, there was not one from an environmental, defense
conversion, or labor organization commenting on a major piece of
legislation with ecological, employment, and other social
implications.  In the Executive Branch, the composition of
high-level science advisory panels--such as the President's
Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology and the National
Science Board--is similarly constricted.


     The problem with exclusively elite, insider approaches to
science policy-making is that they fly in the face of inescapable
realities: (i) All citizens support science through their tax
dollars and experience the profound consequences of science, both
good and bad.  (ii) In a democracy, those who experience the
consequences of an activity and those who pay for it ordinarily
expect a voice in decisions.  (iii) Scientific leaders have no
monopoly on expertise, nor do they have a privileged ethical
standpoint, for evaluating the social consequences of science and
of science policies.  (iv) Nonscientists already do contribute to
science and science policy (for example, women's organizations
have redirected medical research agendas to reduce gender
biases).  (v) Elite-only approaches are antithetical to the open,
vigorous, and creative public debate on which democracy,
policy-making, and science all thrive.  (vi) There is a danger
that public support for science will erode if other perspectives
are excluded.  (vii) With the Cold War concluded, it is time for
science policy to welcome new voices and fresh ideas for
addressing the social needs of the 21st century.


     There are proven methods that use broadened representation
to inform and improve decisions.  The Swedish government's


Council for Planning and Coordination of Research includes a
majority of nonscientists and is noted for promoting innovative
interdisciplinary research programs.  Japan, Germany, and other
European nations have pioneered processes fostering collaboration
between industrial engineers, university scientists, workers, and
end-users in developing new technologies.  Dutch universities
advance social responsiveness via a decentralized national
network of "science shops" that address questions posed directly
by community and worker groups, public-interest organizations,
and local governments.  


     For a decade, the Danish government has appointed panels of
everyday citizens to cross-examine a range of experts and
stakeholders, to deliberate, and then to announce nonbinding
science policy recommendations at a national press conference.  A
1989 Danish citizens' panel on the Human Genome Project seconded
expert support for basic genetics research, but called for more
research on the interplay between environmental factors and
genetic inheritance and on the social consequences of science,
while influencing the Parliament to prohibit the use of genetic
screening information in employment and insurance decisions. 
This carefully structured, participatory process is already being
emulated in other countries, including the United Kingdom, Japan,
the Netherlands, and Switzerland, and has undergone an
independent pilot-scale demonstration in the United States.


     Experiences such as these can light the way toward U.S.
science policies that are more socially responsive and
responsible, more widely supported, and more consonant with the
tradition of openness that is the true lifeblood of science and a
healthy democracy.


______________


Richard E. Sclove is executive director of the Loka Institute,
Amherst, MA, USA, and author of _Democracy and Technology_
(Guilford Press).  E-mail: <Loka () amherst edu>.  For more
information about the ideas and projects discussed in this
editorial, visit the Loka Institute Web page:
<http://www.amherst.edu/~loka>.


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(3) WHAT YOU CAN DO


     From World War II through the end of the Cold War, U.S.
science and technology institutions were powerfully shaped by
national security imperatives.  In the aftermath of the Cold War,
science and technology bureaucracies (e.g., universities, federal
agencies, national laboratories, and corporations) have generally
tried to remobilize for a new "war"--a war for strategic position
in the global economy.  


     But there are other choices.  We could take advantage of the
end of the Cold War to rebuild a science and technology
infrastructure guided by broader and more humane social
imperatives--such as social justice, democracy, environmental
sustainability, high quality jobs, healthy communities, and a
sane pace of life.


     You can contribute to the post-Cold War thaw, and press for
more humane and socially responsive U.S. science and technology
policies, by communicating your views to the Clinton
Administration and to the U.S. Congress.  There's a strateigc


opportunity here, but nothing good will happen if you and I don't
make an effort.  Please send a short note supporting Loka's
editorial, and adding your own views or recommendations, to one
or all of the following forums.  And pass this Alert around,
inviting others to do the same.  (If you visit the Loka
Institute's homepage at <http://www.amherst.edu/~loka> you will
find all of the following suggestions, along with hot links to
make the steps easier for you):


     A.  Newt Gingrich, Speaker of the U.S. House of
Representatives, has asked the House Science Committee to propose
a post-Cold War U.S. science policy.  Visit the Web page for this
process at:


     http://www.house.gov/science/science_policy_study.htm


and leave a comment there.  Committee staff tell us that your
comment will have more impact if it is polite, substantive,
specific, and succinct (ideally no more than one page long; two
pages maximum).  Staff will ask you for follow-up information if
they are interested.  (If you are a U.S. citizen, you might 
increase your odds of being taken seriously if you send
a copy of your message to your own Congressman.  You can locate
your Congressman via the Web at <http://www.house.gov>.)


     B.  President Clinton has just announced proposed changes in
his top science policy advisors and administrators.  E-mail your
comments on U.S. science policy to outgoing Presidential Science
Advisor, Dr. John Gibbons <JGibbons () ostp eop gov>; to newly
nominated Presidential Science Advisor, Dr. Neal Lane
<NLane () nsf gov>; and to the newly nominated director of the U.S.
National Science Foundation, Dr. Rita Colwell
<Colwell () umbi umd edu>. (We would be grateful if you would also
e-mail a copy of your comments to us at the Loka Institute:
<Loka () amherst edu>.)  If you are writing before March 13, you
might mention your concern that Vice President Gore (and       
possibly President Clinton) is scheduled to participate in  
a March 13th "National Summit" on Innovation, organized at      
MIT by the Council on Competitivenss (COC); the attendees of
this event--which is closed to the public, but open to the
COC's corporate and university executives--will "vote"  
their preferences on U.S. R&D policy.  (For info about the
COC, go to <http://nii.nist.gov/coc/coc.html> on the Web.)


     C.  If you want to discuss the democratization of U.S.
science and technology policy with others, subscribe to FASTnet
(the listserv of the Federation of Activists on Science &
Technology Network), and post your comments there.  To subscribe,
send an E-mail message to <majordomo () igc apc org> with a
blank subject line and the message:  subscribe FASTnet


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(4) ABOUT THE LOKA INSTITUTE


     The Loka Institute is a tax-exempt nonprofit organization 
dedicated to making science and technology responsive to 
democratically decided social and environmental concerns. TO
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE LOKA INSTITUTE, to participate in our 
on-line discussion groups, to order publications, to apply as a
volunteer of intern, or to help us financially, visit our Web


page: <http://www.amherst.edu/~loka>.  Or contact us via E-mail
at <Loka () amherst edu>. 
                               ###




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