520 



opinion is volunteered on the particular organizational form to pro- 

 vide these services. The ohserv^ations as to congressional needs for tech- 

 nical information are drawn from the study of a series of case histories 

 of congressional decisionmaking in actual operation since 1945. The 

 general conclusion is that the Congress might benefit from some form 

 of help in compressing the time between (a) the point at which knowl- 

 edgeable specialists perceive a need for an important technical policy 

 decision, and (b) the point at which the Congress judges itself suffi- 

 ciently well informed to make the required decision. 



Put another way, a useful congressional service might be rendered 

 by (a) an early warning system of the need for teclmical decision- 

 making, and (b) a, perfected means for supplying technical informa- 

 tion and information sources to the Congress, These two related serv- 

 ices, it is suggested, would enable Members of Congress to perform 

 more expeditiously and more confidently the task of becoming special- 

 ists to the extent necessary for the decision process on important, 

 urgent, complex technical issues. 



Functions identified in this section could take m.any organizational 

 forms. Among the possibilities are: additions to staffs of individual 

 Members or committees; creation of a new and appropriately staffed 

 joint committee of the Congress; enlargement of the Legislative Ref- 

 erence Service in the Library of Congress ; creation of a separate con- 

 gressional aerency, patterned administratively after the General Ac- 

 counting Ofnce; and perhaps others. For the purpose of conciseness, 

 the collective arrangement to supply the suggested congressional func- 

 tions is referred to hereafter as "the Service," but without any impli- 

 cation that a particular form of organization is intended. 



The primary two functions of the Service might be to provide the 

 Congress with early warninof of tlie possible need for decisionmaking 

 on technical issues, and to develop information resources in anticipa- 

 tion of congressional needs to support such decisionmaking. The kinds 

 of actions to carry out these two functions are so closelv related that 

 thev cnn he considered together, and actually are difficult to separate. 



The Service might maintain a close awareness of changing U.S. 

 social and economic conditions and goals and changing technical capa- 

 bilities, in order to translate these into technical goals and issues. The 

 social and economic goals Avould include those expressed or implied in 

 the published literature, but the relative importance accorded to the 

 development of further information about them could be determined 

 on the basis of expressed congressional interest or by analysis of the 

 Service ns to anticipated future congressional needs for information. 



On the basis of continuinof study, the Service might recommend 

 criteria to determine the relative importance and urgency of technical 

 issues, and could assist the Congress by assembling and providing 

 information indicative of the relative importance and urgency of 

 national technical goals. The Service might identify, from the litera- 

 ture and from contacts with technical institutions and informed per- 

 sons, the potential dangers and hazards to U.S. welfare resulting from 

 technical artifacts in a changing technical culture; the Service could 

 keep itself ready to advise the Congress about the technical goals 

 necessarv to reduce such dano-ers and hazards. 



