CHAPTER SIX— CONGRESSIONAL RESPONSE TO 

 PROJECT CA^IELOT 



I. Introduction 



Project Camelot was a project in applied research in the social 

 sciences sponsored by the Department of Defense. It was designed to 

 study the political, economic, and social preconditions of instability 

 and potential Communist usurpation of power in several developing 

 countries. Public disclosure of the existence of the project, in June 

 1965, made front page news. Reaction to the disclosure was prompt 

 and vociferous, Latin Americans of all political shades saw the project 

 as related to recent U.S. troop landings in Santo Domingo; appre- 

 hensions were widely expressed that the United States intended to 

 intervene elsewhere in the internal affairs of the sovereign States of 

 Latin America. Members of the U.S. Congress were also outspoken 

 in their reactions to the project, raising such questions as — 



What was the Department of Defense doing? 



What was the propriety of such a military invasion of the field 

 of foreign policy research ? 



Why had the President permitted military operations to damage 

 U.S. relations with a Latin American neighbor ? 



Why had the Department of State played no role to prevent or 

 control activities within its jurisdiction by another Department? 

 During its formal assessment of Project Camelot, the Congress 

 ordered a halt to the study and withheld appropriations for the Special 

 Operations Research Office (SORO), the contractor performing the 

 work for the Department of Defense under a contract administered 

 by the Department of the Army. However, the interest of the Congress 

 went further: the Legislature, the Administration, and the social 

 science community apparently recognized that "big social science" (or 

 applied social science) had become an essential fixture in government; 

 accordingly, a mechanism was needed for the assessment of the entire 

 relationship between the Federal Government and the social sciences. 

 Various uncoordinated and sporadic moves were made, before 1965, 

 to fashion an effective relationship between Government and the social 

 sciences — a relationship to solve problems of priority, propriety, util- 

 ity, funding, and ethics.^ The repercussions of the Camelot episode 



1 Many of these problems were scanned during congressional debates regarding the in- 

 clusion of the social sciences in the National Science Foundation. (See Chapter Five of this 

 compilation.) Other early reviews are: Milton D. Graham. Federal Utilization of Social 

 Science Research : Exploration of the Problems — A Preliminary Paper. (Washington, D.C., 

 The Brookings Institution. August 1954). 146 pages. (Mr. Graham was formerly with the 

 Research and Development Board, Department of Defense and with the Human Resources 

 Research Institute of the U.S. Air Force.) See also: The Technology of Human Behavior. 

 Recommendations for Defense Support of Research in Psychology arid the Social Sciences. 

 A report submitted to the Office of Science, Director of Defense Research and Engineering 

 in accordance with the provisions of the Contract No. 1354/08. By the Research Group In 

 Psychology and the Social Sciences. (Washington, D.C.. Smithsonian Institution, July 1966) 

 39 pages ; Ithlel de Sola Pool, et al.. Social Science Research and National Security. A Re- 

 port Prepared by the Research Group in Psychology and the Social Sciences, Smithsonian 

 Institution, Washington, D.C. Under Office of Naval Research Contract No. 1354 (08), Task 



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