pending and proposed legislation make acquisi- 

 tion and maintenance of patents so difficult that 

 they approach confiscation of privately 

 developed technology in fields considered to be 

 crucial to the "public interest." This philosophy 

 can do nothing more than discourage investment 

 in major high-cost, high-risk research programs. 



On the subject of antitrust legislation, he 

 added: 



Even if patent protection provided appropriate 

 incentives, many projects envision development 

 costs beyond those that can be underwritten by 

 even the largest corporations. Such research 

 could be undertaken on a consortium basis to 

 permit tolerable financing and to avoid costly 

 duplication of effort. However, precedents 

 suggest that this approach could be subject to 

 challenge under the anti-trust laws. This problem 

 can be eliminated by consistent, understandable 

 guidelines as to the Federal Government inter- 

 pretation of the application of the anti-trust laws 

 to joint research and development projects or 

 through new, more liberal legislation. 



Government 



In the Government research sector, 

 overregulation was also felt, but in a different 

 form. Since these laboratories are directly 

 managed, or at least funded, by the Govern- 

 ment, their concern was with overmanagement, 

 or too many restrictions imposed by higher 

 administrative levels. This issue ranked third 

 among all respondents from this sector com- 

 bined, and was actually second among FFRDC's 

 as Table 3 of Appendix E shows. In view of the 

 open-ended manner in which the questions 

 were posed to the respondents, the similarity 

 between many of their statements is 

 remarkable, and suggests the existence of 

 widespread and deep concern. Two examples 

 will illustrate the flavor of this concern. J. E. 

 Colvard, Technical Director at the Naval 

 Surface Weapons Center, wrote that: 



The major problem I see facing research in the 

 near future is "over management by multiple 

 levels of review." This over management so 

 overwhelms the other problems that it makes 

 them minor. 



. . The dollars appropriated for research are 

 adequate. The dollars expended on research are 

 inadequate because so many of the dollars are 

 spent in reviewing and managing the research. 



From George H. Vineyard, Director of the 

 Brookhaven National Laboratory, came the 

 statement that: 



Among many critical issues, in addition to the 

 perennial question of funds, I would single out 

 these: 



1. At what level should the primary respon- 

 sibility for directing research programs 

 reside? 



Should it be with the individual scientist and 

 his institution, or should it be in 

 Washington? 



The first issue arises because of the strong 

 tendency for research to be directed more and 

 more from Washington. As public concern with 

 technological issues has increased and as this 

 concern has been reflected in Congress and in 

 the Federal agencies, tighter management from 

 above is being imposed. In this Laboratory, for 

 example, the degree of detailed involvement of 

 our principal sponsor (ERDA) in setting priorities 

 and determining the nature of each research 

 program is rapidly increasing, and no limit is in 

 sight. Along with this, our budgets become ever 

 more fine-grained and detailed. 



Vineyard adds that ERDA has been made 

 aware of this problem and is reviewing it. 

 Another laboratory director spoke of 

 "pragmatic micromanagement"; while 

 elsewhere it was termed "excessive program 

 control"; or "management of, control of, in- 

 fluence on, and guidance of science by n on scien- 

 tists." All these directors seemed to have in 

 mind the same problem: decreasing autonomy 

 of their institutions, vis-a-vis their parent or 

 sponsoring agencies, OMB, and Congress. The 

 views of the laboratory directors on this issue, 

 furthermore, were shared in higher levels of 

 their agencies, a fact evidenced by the letter of 

 John Naugle, Acting Associate Administrator of 

 NASA. Naugle, taking a perspective sym- 

 pathetic to the laboratories, discussed the 

 "problem of overdirection of basic research," 

 and observed that: 



FREEDOM IN THE RESEARCH SYSTEM 



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