914 



— detailed description of duties scientists would have to per- 

 form; and 



— temporary increase in CIEP staff to provide a special scien- 

 tific recruitment officer."* 



Conclusion 



The Nation's first post-WWII program to send U.S. senior scientific 

 personnel abroad to research and lecture was the Fulbright program, 

 inaugurated in 1946. Its basic purpose is political — to promote inter- 

 national cooperation by familiarizing scholars of other countries with 

 American achievements in science, education, and culture. U.S. scien- 

 tific and technical professionals are exchanged under the provisions 

 of the senior Fulbright-Hays program, which provides grants, travel 

 funds, and stipends for Americans to lecture, teach, and conduct 

 research abroad. The American scientific community has played a 

 significant role in this program. During the last few years, scientific 

 and technical personnel have been recommended for more than 50 

 percent of the lectureship and research scholar openings. 



The descriptive and factual history of the program illustrates several 

 interactions between scientific exchange and diplomacy. In support of 

 initiating and promoting exchanges, this program, like others which 

 followed it, .has profited from State Department efforts to remove 

 foreign administrative and diplomatic obstacles to the movement of 

 scientists, scientific information, and equipment. As the program 

 evolved, its cooperative aspects were expanded. Provision was made for 

 the signing of bilateral executive agreements and joint funding; and 

 more important, the program sought to insure bilateral cooperation by 

 establishing overseas binational commissions to plan the content and 

 scope of exchange. Also, in an effort to maintain the integrity of educa- 

 tional exchange, the Congress and the State Department delegated 

 responsibility for day-to-day selection, evaluation, and program 

 operations to several quasi-governmental groups composed of eminent 

 scholars. 



When the program was first inaugurated, U.S. scientific and 

 technical personnel were eager to participate. But as the program 

 evolved, expanding into the developing countries, and as it became 

 more binational, the quality of scientific participation decreased, 

 especially for service in the developing countries. The program history 

 indicates that little difl&culty has arisen in filling quotas for scientific 

 exchange in Europe, which typically receives a majority of exchanges, 

 a majority of research awards, and a disproportionate number of all 

 scientific and technological exchanges per year. By contrast, the quotas 

 for scientific exchanges in other parts of the world must be filled by 

 recruitment, in many cases with individuals whose qualifications do 

 not match those of scholars exchanged with Europe. 



Difficulties in securing scientific participation for the developing 

 countries include : 



— binational planning which supports cooperation, but im- 

 poses a variety of constraints on the conduct of scientific activity, 

 including requests for highly trained scientific specialists, some- 

 times in short supply in the United States, and for exchanges 

 to support technical assistance, an unattractive field for scientific 

 scholars anxious to profit from high-quality educational inter- 

 change or research ; 



lu "Semi-annual report, CIEP to B FS," January 1, 1960 to June 30, 1960, op. cit., pp. 6-7. 



