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U.S. PARTICIPATION AT CERN 133 



portion to their GNP of the past 3 years, with the proviso that no nation 

 shall contribute more than 25 percent of the total budget. At present, the 

 674 million Swiss francs ($320 million) annual operating budget is 

 subscribed 25 percent by Germany, 21.7 percent by France, etc., down 

 to 0.36 percent by Greece. 



Certain decisions, such as the LEP construction, have to be supported 

 and subscribed to by unanimous vote of the CERN Council. This gives 

 unusual weight to the small nations and acts as a safeguard against the 

 domination of the fate of the organization by the large contributors. The 

 recent agreement to establish LEP was preceded by endless negotiations. 

 A special convention saw only two-thirds of the member states in favor 

 of LEP. It took special negotiations by the Council to mute the preoc- 

 cupations of several countries and reach unanimity. 



Given the above organizational features of CERN, what miakes it the 

 success it has been? It should first of all be remembered that the discipline 

 itself sets the tone of the activities (see section above). But in practice, 

 here are patterns that have evolved over the years which must be 

 couiited important: 



• Experimental teams, large or small, very rarely if ever are composed 

 of people from one member state only. Most collaborations have 

 multinational membership. 



• CERN management has never been shy about imposing organiza- 

 tional conditions on experiment proponents, including the recommen- 

 dation that teamsfromother (usually less well supported) nations be ab- 

 sorbed into a collaboration. This has, notwithstanding its interference in 

 the internal workings of scientific teams, ensured that strong and well- 

 funded nations would not dominate the scene. 



• There is no history of national rivalries, of chauvinism among 

 CERN teams; competition for support means, for beamtime, or for ap- 

 proval of an experiment is tough, sometimes even vicious, but always 

 directed at the task at hand. 



• In its decision-making process, CERN management has invariably 

 been mindful of the societal impact of the laboratory. This has 

 sometimes led to the support of programs the principal distinction of 

 which appeared to be that they would feed a large number of physicists, 

 rather than maximum scientific merit. 



• CERN has consistently opened its door to outsiders: Although 

 scientists from nonmember countries do not share in all the privileges of 

 their European colleagues, U.S. participation has been significant and 

 steady; Russian and Chinese scientists have collaborated directly at 

 CERN or from their home institutions; so have people from many other 



