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The Scientific Ethos of Reagan's America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Roger Williams
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WHILE STATES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN IN COMPETITION, modern states are in competition in an historically unique way. Only since the Second world War has it become generally appreciated that the mastery of technical change is vital to economic success, to such military security as is available, and, in short, to political achievement in a world in which expectations are unprecedentedly high. Since the political system of a state is inescapably a major factor in that state's overall performance, it follows that the efficiency and effectiveness of the world's various political systems are now, in an important sense, under long-term test. Whether over time most systems will tend to an asymptotic common performance, or whether some will reveal themselves as objectively ‘better’ than others is thus, really for the first time, a meaningful issue, and one which each succeeding generation can be expected to do a little more to resolve. In this context particular interest attaches in the immediate future to the relative performances of the United States, the Soviet Union, Japan, and Western Europe, the latter considered both as separate states and collectively. This article is concerned only with the United States, but a reference frame of permanent international competition, in accommodating to and capitalizing upon technical change, needs to be borne in mind throughout.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , 01 April 1987 , pp. 175 - 193
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1987

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References

1 King, Anthony (ed.), The New American Political System, Washington DC, The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1978, p. 388 Google Scholar. See also Chubb, John E. and Peterson, Paul E., The New Directions in American Politics, Washington DC, The Brookings Institution, 1985 Google Scholar.

2 Terms employed by Brzezinski, Zbigniew K., Between Two Ages: America’s Role in the Technetronic Era, New York, Viking Press, 1970 Google Scholar; Ellul, Jacques, The Technological Society, London, Cape, 1965 Google Scholar; Bell, Daniel, The Coming of Post-Industrial Society: a venture in social forecasting, New York, Basic Books, 1975 Google Scholar.

3 Galbraith, J. K., The New Industrial State, Hamish Hamilton, 1967, Ch. 2Google Scholar.

4 See for instance the invaluable text by Peters, B. Guy, American Public Policy. Promise and Performance, London, Macmillan, 1986, Ch. 2CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 More generally useful is Treadway, Jack, Public Policy Making in the American States, New York, Praeger, 1985 Google Scholar.

6 Larsen, Judith K. and Rogers, Everett M., Silicon Valley Fever, London, George Allen & Unwin, 1985 Google Scholar.

7 Recent literature in this area includes Harold M. Barger, The Impossible Presidency: Illusions and Realities of Executive Power, Glenview 111., Scott, Foreman, 1984, and Theodore Lowi, The Personal President: Power Invested, Promise Unfulfilled, Ithaca, N.Y., Cornell University Press, 1985.

8 See for example Robert Stobaugh and Daniel Yergin, Energy Future, Report of the Energy Project at the Harvard Business School, New York, Ballantine, 1980, p. 277.

9 A term used by Alvin Weinberg.

10 See Barfield, Claude E., Science Policy from Ford to Reagan, Washington DC, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1982, p. 31 Google Scholar.

11 A valuable review is Logsdon, John M., ‘The Evolution of Civilian Space Exploitation’ in Schwarz, Michiel and Stares, Paul, (eds), The Exploitation of Space, London, Butterworth, 1985 Google Scholar.

12 As with the military industrial complex, the literature in the area of US science policy/science advice is now vast. A useful recent addition is W. Henry Lambright, Presidential Management of Science and Technology: The Johnson Presidency, Austin, University of Texas Press, 1985. The scientific and technical community has since 1957 been a very powerful lobby — and one which has had the very great advantage of institutionalized access to the White House.

13 See, for instance, Reppy, Judith, ‘The United States’, in Ball, Nicole and Leitenberg, Milton (eds), The Structure of the Defence Industry, London, Croom Helm, 1983 Google Scholar.

14 From among many, Yarmolinsky, Adam and Foster, Gregory D., Paradoxes of Power: The Military Establishment in the Eighties, Bloomington, Indiana, University Press, 1983 Google Scholar is an update of a much used earlier version.

15 See for example Shapley, Deborah and Roy, Rustum, Lost at the Frontier: US Science and Technology Policy Adrift, Institute for Scientific Information, 1985. Also David, Jr, ‘An Industry Picture of US Science Policy’, Science, V, 232, 23 05 1986, pp. 968–71Google Scholar.

16 Lloyd, J., Dumas, Edward E., ‘The Military Burden on the Economy’, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 10 1986, p. 26 Google Scholar.

17 See Nelkin, Dorothy, ‘Changing Attitudes Towards Technology in the United States’, in Williams, Roger and Mills, Stephen, (eds), Public Acceptance of New Technologies, London, Croom Helm, 1986 Google Scholar.

18 See for example McQuaid, Kim, Big Business and Presidential Power, New York, William Morrow, 1982 Google Scholar.

19 A typical view is Ramo, Simon, America’s Technology Slip, New York, John Wiley, 1980 Google Scholar.

20 Mansfield, Edwin, ‘Technology and Productivity in the United States’, in Feldstein, Martin (ed.), The American Economy in Transition, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1980 Google Scholar. Also Neil Baily, Martin, ‘What has happened to Productivity Growth?’, Science, V 234, 24 10 1986, pp.: 443–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 Financial Times, 27 January 1987.

22 There is an emerging literature of American decline, e.g. Krieger, Joel, Reagan, Thatcher and the Politics of Decline, Polity Press, 1986 Google Scholar and Bowles, Samuel, Gordon, David M., Weisskopf, Thomas E., Beyond the Wasteland: A Democratic Alternative to Economic Decline, New York, Doubleday, 1983 Google Scholar.

23 Vogel, Ezra Feivel, Japan as Number One: Lessons for America, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1980 Google Scholar.

24 E.g. Solo, Robert A., The Positive State, Cincinatti, South Western Publishing, 1982 Google Scholar.

25 For example: Wolfe, Alan, America’s Impasse: The Rise and Fall of the Politics of Growth, New York, Pantheon Books, 1981 Google Scholar; Thurow, Lester C, The Zero Sum Society: Distribution and the Possibilities for Economic Change, New York, Basic Books, 1980 Google Scholar; Walker, David B., Towards a Functioning Federalism, Cambridge, Mass., Winthrop Publishers, 1981 Google Scholar.

26 Wall Street Journal, 31 January 1984.

27 A recent book in this connection is Greenberg, Edward S., Capitalism and the American Political Ideal Armonk, New York, M. E. Sharpe, 1985 Google Scholar.

28 Brogan, Hugh, Longman History of the United States of America, London, Longman, 1986, pp. 264–5Google Scholar.

29 This is Hugh Brogan’s conclusion in his excellent book, ibid., p. 265.