1687 



How can the United States best incorporate scientific and technological factors 

 in making its national decisions, including foreign policy? 



Under what circumstances does international scientific and technological 

 cooperation serve the national interest? 



What factors favor international cooperation in science and technology? 



What factors hinder such cooperation? 



How can the United States best use its scientific and technological resources in 

 support of its national decisions, including its foreign policy? ^»* 



Thereafter, the present study notes, congressional interest in the 

 .scientific and technological aspects of foreign policy "appears to have 

 followed, in approximate order of emphasis, four sets of considera- 

 tions, as follows:" 



1. The strengthening of the science office and other elements in the Department 

 of State to deal with aU these matters; 



2. Broad reviews of global trends in social, economic, military, and technical 

 development as background for more specific legislative initiatives; 



3. National science and technology policy, with international aspects as an 

 essential element; and 



4. Specific international issues with substantial scientific or technological 

 content, ^m 



The study examines congressional concerns under all of these 

 headings. It notes that while Congress has followed closely the many 

 reorganizations of the Department of State since World War II in 

 related reports and studies, it has chosen in the main not to prescribe 

 organizational forms and procedures but has relied on the State 

 Department to accomplish its own modernization. A notable excep- 

 tion was the congressional action in 1973 to create the new position 

 of Assistant Secretary of State heading a new Bureau of Oceans and 

 International Environmental and Scientific Affairs: ^^^ 



. . . This action apparently had the threefold purpose of (a) requiring intensified 

 attention to the diplomatic importance of the oceans and the environment in a 

 technological setting, (b) consolidating in one organization a number of diplo- 

 matic functions with a substantial technical content, and (c) providing statutory 

 emphasis to the State Department science office as a legitimate copartner with 

 the ranking regional and functional Assistant Secretaries in the policymaking 

 hierarchy of the Department. In its new form, OES today presents one organization 

 that covers oceans, environment, nonmilitary atomic energy, population matters, 

 bilateral science agreements, technology, and basic science generally. Welding 

 these elements into a coherent pattern seems to present a formidable as well as 

 important task. It is hkely to be one that wiU take time and eflfort.^'* 



STUDIES AND HEARINGS BT HOUSE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE 



Of the many hearings, reports, and staff studies which testify to the 

 growing congressional interest since World War II in scientific and 

 technological trends affecting U.S. foreign policy, the study cites 

 several notable examples. One was an investigation begun in 1969 

 by the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on National Security 

 Policy and Scientific Developments into the relationships between 

 national strategy and science. The emphasis of this investigation 

 was heavily on the technology of weaponry and its diplomatic con- 

 sequences. However, the concluding witness. Under Secretary of 

 State for Political Affairs U. Alexis Johnson, broadened the scope of 

 the discussion with his statement that "Another set of questions 

 relevant to national security concerns the role technological change 



2»5 Ibid., pp. 1452-1453. 



2»« Ibid., p. 1453. 



2" For details of this move, see ibid., pp. 1369-1372. 



2^'> Ibid., p. 1453. 



