From the beginning, science has nourished the political ideal that its knowledge and applications should liberate men from magic, fear, and oppression. Salomon traces this ideal from its origin through the early nineteenth-century French laissez-faire attitude, which tolerated but did not yet underwrite scientific research, to the time when American scientists put the atom at the disposition of the military, Roosevelt asked American researchers to help effect the New Deal, and Léon Blum made Irene Joliot-Curie and Jean Perrin undersecretaries for scientific research.  "This book is about politics—about political decision and action on issues which affect science," writes Salomon. He deals with basic rather than social science and focuses on research subsidized by governments for military and defense purposes. He is concerned equally with an empirical investigation of the scientist's condition in modern society and with a philosophical examination of the moral questions involved in the scientist's relations with political authority and in the changed nature of science itself.  Science and Politics poses precisely those questions about values, science, and politics that lie at the heart of the contemporary American debate about the moral and political implications of technology. The book presents its issues in a comparative perspective. Most of the cases are drawn from American experiences "because this relation [of science to power] assumed the institutionalized form which it now has in all industrialized countries earlier and on a larger scale in the United States, with more acute problems, greater awareness and a richer effort of reflection than elsewhere..."  The speculative conclusion of the book is that against the idea of "pure" science and the idea of "applied" science will rise up the notion of the realm of "science, period," where scientific man will not only engage in pure and applied research but will also consider science more carefully in its problematic relation to humanity.

Science and politics,

SALOMON, Jean-Jacques

Science & Math

Macmillan

Futuribles 293, janvier 2004. L'enjeu du clonage humain: L'évaluation extra-financière des entreprises

BÉNICHOU, Grégory

NEYRAUT, Michel

FATOUX, François

TIBERGHIEN, Frédéric

FUTURIBLES

Futuribles 298, juin 2004. France : misère de la recherche: Pour une réforme des Nations unies

DELANNOY, Benjamin

HÉRAULT, Bruno

TOULEMON, Robert

CAZES, Bernard

Futuribles 300, septembre 2004. Une nouvelle vague de croissance ?: L'invasion des nanotechnologies

DUPUY, Jean-Pierre

MULDUR, Ugur

DELANGHE, Henri

DUCHENE, Vincent

Futuribles 302, novembre 2004. Moyen-Orient : le fantasme américain: Prospective en Afrique du Sud

COLSON, Aurélien

Rosnay, Joël de

BONNAURE, Pierre

ORIVEL, Estelle

Science - "empirical knowledge" - and technology - "applied science" - have long played a key role in social development. In modern times they have come to be seen as absolutely essential factors in the achievement of economic growth and development. And though many dispute their ascendancy and legitimately point to their abuses, there is no escaping their presence and impact.Taking as a main theme the central role of science and technology in economic progress, this first-of-a-kind sourcebook gathers together the perspectives and expertise of an international body of specialists in science and technology policy to examine the role of science and technology in development, and assess their social, economic, and political dimensions. The authors look at the key issues in relation to the exigencies of developing countries in the "new international context." They emphasize the complexity of the links between science, technology, and development and the important insights to be gained from the study of these links. The authors also point out that, despite science and technology's promise of social and economic progress, such progress is less than ever an inevitable result of their application - though there is no doubt about what can be achieved through science and technology, the quest is an uncertain one.

The Uncertain Quest: Science, Technology, and Development

Politics & Social Sciences

Sagasti, Francisco R.

Social Sciences

United Nations Univ

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