740 



INTERNATIONAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY ACTIVITIES 

 OF "DOMESTIC" DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES 



E. B. Skolnikoff 

 Office of Science and Technology Policy 

 Sepcernber 13, 1979 



'roblen 



The inrernacional dinension of science and technology, always 

 Inportanc, is receiving increasing policy inceresr, especially wich 

 respecc CO incernacional programs and activities of US Government 

 agencies carried out for purposes that can vary from advancing a research 

 objective to attempts to use science or technology to achieve a political 

 objective. The mixture of such objectives often raises difficult policy, 

 managejient , and political problems, particularly for agencies whose 

 mandate does not normally or predominantly lie in international areas. 



The broader purpose of these international activities is the same 

 as that for the support of science and technology itself — to contribute 

 to the nation's domestic and international goals. The problems encountered, 

 however, have tended to discourage substantial and fully productive use 

 of US resources, especially with regard to support of international 

 goals, and lead to a need to reexanine the present situation and explore 

 alternative approaches to meeting those problems. 



The t;ue..tioa to be examined can be simply stated as how to achieve 



more effective use of science and technology, and in particular of the 



scientific and technological resources of the US Government, in the 



Si-Tvice of national interests in the international arena, wiiile maintaining 

 rospouslble policy and management control. 



The operational issues that must be addressed tend to take the 

 form, in the day-to-day policy process, of management and budget questions. 

 Most often they stem from the fact that the agencies with the scientific 

 expertise and resources have historically and politically a domestic 

 orientation. Those agencies concerned primarily with foreign policy and 

 international development must rely heavily on the "domestic" agencies 

 for the conduct of international activities in science and technology 

 and, more generally, for sensitivity to the international dimensions of 

 those fields. The present process for dealing with this multiagency 

 dependence often leads to dissatisfaction with the quality of progran:s, 

 with the arrangements by which different agences are involved, with the 

 cpportunities missed, and with the funding problems encountered. It 

 also fails to reflect both the growing interest in the Executive Branch 

 and the Congress in making better use of international activities in 

 science and technology, and the increasing pressure induced by evolving 

 global issues to involve science and technology more adequately in their 

 solution. 



