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NICHOLS: FOREIGN POLICY 189 



capacity to invent, that is— research; force is the capacity for converting 

 inventions into products, that is— technology." In this observation lies 

 the kernel of what many nations see as a critical role for science and tech- 

 nology serving foreign policy's purposes. 



Consider the newspaper's categorization of the globe into various 

 "worlds"— the "first world" of the OECD industrialized nations, the "sec- 

 ond world" of the Soviet Union and its Eastern European allies, and the 

 "third world" which is the developing countries. (More discriminating 

 journalists divide the globe further into fourth and fifth worlds, based 

 roughly upon resources per capita.) These numbers suggest a power- 

 related rank-ordering. In fact, we often measure changes in international 

 relations, and the status of a nation's geopolitical power today, in terms 

 of the degree to which nations have applied technology successfully to 

 building up their domestic and foreign strengths. Will national power in 

 the future continue to be proportional to the capacity for, and the pro- 

 ductivity of, research and development? 



A related major goal derives from the hopes of people everywhere for 

 increased welfare— or, in the current phrase, greater "equity." For the 

 developing nations, the aim is to draw on the world's technological expe- 

 rience to increase economic activity and meet the basic human needs of 

 their people. For the industrialized nations, a meaningful policy to im- 

 prove welfare increasingly demands better control of the new technology 

 that is required to achieve humane purposes. 



With this admittedly superficial skimming of the profound issues of 

 power and welfare in the world — and the way in which science and tech- 

 nology serve those goals — we can race rapidly through a number of 

 other crucial goals of foreign policy. 



Deterrence and defense are of interest to all nations. For the OECD 

 nations, we think of the NATO alliance and the Strategic Arms Limita- 

 tion Talks as prime examples of the use of advanced technology to serve 

 the goals of war-prevention and arms control. Indeed, it is a cliche to 

 note that without the most sophisticated technology, there could not 

 even be hope for assured verification (by national means) of the pro- 

 posed SALT II treaty. 



Turning to a likely superpower of the next century, the People's Re- 

 public of China includes both defense and science/technology among its 

 "four modernizations." China says that science and technology will be 

 essential to assure success in its defense and, thus, in its foreign policy. 

 However, its alliances may shift over the next generation as international 

 technological trends unfold. 



As a final example, in almost any scenario about how the superpowers 



