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cormitnent of funds than is typical. In some cases, funding may also be 

 necessary for higher infrastructure and travel costs, even if overall costs 

 would be lower. Those extra funds have always been difficult to appropriate, 

 and in particularly tight budgets, they appear as direct reductions in 

 domestic research funds, and thus inevitably contentious. 



It is also worthwhile noting not only the difficulty, but also the 

 importance, of making the "domestic" agencies of the U.S. Government conscious 

 of the international framework in which R&D is actually embedded. The 

 potential practical payoffs are obvious: U.S. R&D can benefit from work in 

 other countries, much more of which is now equal to U.S. R&D in quality, and 

 more frequently there will be parallel work of direct relevance to U.S. R&D 

 objectives, and increasing opportunities for cost sharing or for faster 

 progress toward R&D goals. 



Of course, all the obstacles do not reside within the Governr.ient, though 

 the process difficulties within government do have their resonance in the 

 scientific community. Realization of the difficulties in funding 

 international cooperation, or experience in trying to satisfy the 

 difficulties, is often an effective disincentive for scientists to invest the 

 time required to bring cooperative projects to the point at which they could 

 be considered in the research competition. In many cases, of course, the 

 opportunities and appropriateness, because of special equipment, skills, or 

 the nature of the subject, make the effort to overcome the difficulties worth 

 the candle. But, in marginal or less clear cases, the disincentives loom 

 large. 



Aside from the difficulties inherent in obtaining funding, other factors 

 serve as disincentives to scientists considering international cooperation. 

 The time delays necessarily involved; the extra travel, language and cultural 

 obstacles to initiate cross-national interaction; and the different national 

 patterns of allocation of research funds (which can result, for example, in 

 disparities of funding and uncertainties of the results of priority ranking); 

 also are important. Moreover, scientists are not immune from national biases, 

 notwithstanding the non-national basis of scientific knowledge. Particularly 

 in the U.S., many scientists know little about the details of work in other 

 countries, and have little interest in international cooperation. Some view 

 international cooperation as inimical to the competitive race for national 

 prestige and preeminence, and are not inclined to collaborate unless 

 absolutely necessary. 



And, of course, the growing national concern with the presumed economic 

 and security costs of transfer of technology has served to put a further 

 damper on official interest in international cooperation. Though that does 

 not a1;fect many scientific fields, it certainly is relevant to those in which 

 the distance between the laboratory and application is shrinking — such as 

 electronics and biotechnology. The target of the concern, still largely 

 focused on security, will almost certainly turn increasingly to economic 

 issues. Growing pressures for "technological protectionism" cannot help but 

 prove to be a deterrent to international scientific cooperation. 



