1497 



program development that have been suggested here as among the principal 

 functions of the council. It would enable the council to intervene, side by side 

 with those within the Department of State responsible for scientific affairs, at 

 the points where policy is actively determined, particularly where Presidential 

 initiatives or interests are immediately involved.^'s 



State and Presidential Policymaking in Science 



The combined role of Dr. Kissinger as Secretary of State and 

 Special Assistant for National Security Affairs ties the Department 

 more closely to the National Security Council, and to Presidential 

 policymaking generally. On the other hand, the action by President 

 Nixon in eliminating the Presidential Office of Science Adviser and the 

 Office of Science and Technology (OST), and in transferring the 

 function to the Director of NSF,^" niay have had adverse effects on 

 science policymaking in State. In particular, it eliminated a point of 

 access and a source of support and stimulus useful to the State science 

 office. At the same time it increased the responsibility of SCI/OES for 

 coordinating interagency science policy in the international field. (For 

 example, the FCST international committee was transferred to SCI 

 shortly after the PSAC international committee was dissolved along 

 with OST. These actions left SCI, along with a small Science and 

 Technology Policy Office (STPO), formed to assist the NSF Director 

 in his Presidential advisory role, as the residual claimants to the 

 function of international science and technology policy planning and 

 coordination.) 



Dean Brooks (Dr. Harvey Brooks, dean, Division of Engineering 

 and Applied Physics and the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard 

 University), indeed, sees difficulties both domestic and foreign, in 

 the removal of the science advisor}' function from close proximity 

 to the White House: 



I think the difficulties with the transfer of the science office to NSF are probably 

 greater in domestic than in foreign policy, but there is no question that there are 

 universal difficulties in confusing the roles of operating and policy organizations. 

 It is true that the NSF Directors wears an independent "hat" in his advisory 

 role, but that fiction will be maintained with increasing difficulty as time goes 

 on. As Skolnikoff and I state in our Science ai"ticle, a science and technologj' policy 

 office in State needs a counterpart in the Executive Office which can channel its 

 recommendations and policy perspectives directly to the Presdient. The removal 

 of the science advisory mechanism to NSF has left a vacuum of independent 



2" National Academy of Sciences, ad hoc Committee on Science and Technology, Science and Technology 

 in Presidential Policymaking: A Proposal (Wasliington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences, June 1974), 

 p. 45. 



^ These actions were accomplished in Reorganization Plan No. 1,^ January 26, 1973, and became effective 

 July 1, 1973. The action also eliminated the President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) and trans- 

 ferred the Federal Council for Science and Technology to NSF jurisdiction. 



An assessment of the three-way interaction among SCI-NSF-NSC after Reorganization Plan No. 1 be- 

 came effective is offered by Pollack as follows: 



The transfer of the Presidential science and technology machinery to the Director of NSF was 

 interpreted in the Department of State as a weakening of the White House role which, in interna- 

 tional scientific matters, had previously been rather strong. Witness the Hornig, DuBridge and 

 David foreign trips for example. As a consequence of the shift the Department of State science and 

 technology activity did attempt to be more assertive in exercising inter-departmental leadership 

 and in managing relationships with foreign science and technology leadership. However, the absence 

 of a White House official identified with science and technology and the somewhat ambivalent 

 status of the head of NSF did weaken the U.S. in its international scientific relationships. In this 

 day and age, there is a need for a clearly recognized leader of science within the government structure 

 to order affairs within the government for international relations and other purposes as well. 



As for relations on science and technology matters between the State Department and the Na- 

 tional Security Council, the President's Science Adviser and his staff were usually a third party to 

 the relationship. Under the present arrangement neither the Director of NSF or his staff has served 

 in that capacity except on a few issues. The State Department and the NSC staff were left to their 

 own devices and as a consequence the cooperation between them deepened, perhaps of necessity. 

 Of coiuse, it was helpful to have NSC and the State Department headed by the same man. 



<PoUack to Huddle, March 25, 1975.) 



