First Meeting of President’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology

The President’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) held its first meeting this week. During one and one-half days of discussion, open to the public, this private-sector committee broadly reviewed the administration’s science and technology goals and grappled with how it should provide advice to President Clinton and the cabinet-level National Science and Technology Council (NSTC.)

Vice President Gore announced the membership of PCAST on August 3 during the release of the administration’s science policy document, “Science in the National Interest.” PCAST is co-chaired by John Gibbons, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, and John Young, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard Co., and has seventeen members drawn from academia, private industry, and other institutions (see FYI #130.)

Before the meeting started, PCAST members were introduced to Vice President Gore. (President Clinton was preparing for his trip to the Middle East.) Gore welcomed the committee and engaged in an informal discussion touching on the diversity of the members’ backgrounds and the perspective that they could provide on issues in science, technology, and society. In opening remarks, Gibbons discussed an over-arching concern of the administration: deficit reduction. Drawing down the deficit will free-up capital to invest in science and technology, Gibbons said. He reaffirmed the administration’s view of science and technology as the “centerpiece” of an investment strategy. Gibbons briefly discussed how science funding is changing, citing efforts to reallocate money from defense to civilian budgets, as well as increasing cooperative agreements with private industry.

The first hours of the meeting consisted of four ten-minute presentations and brief Q&A by the Associate Directors of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP.) M.R.C. Greenwood, discussing “World Leadership in Basic Science, Mathematics, and Engineering,” identified three critical issues for PCAST: “Determining the Investment (including Federal Role; Private Sector Role); Improving Participation and Access in Science; Enhancing Science Education and Public Literacy.” Referring to the budget caps on discretionary spending, Greenwood cautioned that there would be “substantial difficulties in maintaining the investment” in science and technology. She spoke of increasing public and private funding of R&D to approximately 3% of the gross domestic product (now 2.6%,) a goal in “Science in the National Interest.”

One PCAST member asked about the downsizing of the defense budget, and its effect on physics and mathematics funding. Greenwood called this a “critical issue,” acknowledging that perceptions about the relevance of fundamental science to the traditional mission agencies may be changing. The challenge, she said, is “how to sustain the physical science base in a rational way.”

In his presentation on “Technology for Economic Growth,” Skip Johns cited budget constraints which necessitate reorienting federal spending, rather than just increasing it. He discussed the Technology Reinvestment Program, the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles, the National Space Transportation Policy, the National Information Infrastructure, and education/training programs. In response to questions, Johns said “we take metrics very seriously” in determining a program’s success.

Jane Wales’ discussion on “Enhancing National Security and International Cooperation” revolved around applying technology to new defense needs and stability/security. She touched on the need to increase international collaborative efforts, while acknowledging the difficulty of building a lasting domestic consensus for this approach. Wales mentioned India, Russia, China, South Africa, Brazil and Argentina as countries requiring special attention since they have the means of producing weapons of mass destruction. She urged the science and technology community to strengthen its relationships with these and other countries, saying that often such ties were more important than those between governments.

The final presentation, entitled “Environmental Quality and Sustainability” was given by Bob Watson. Watson stressed the need to frame issues so that they will not be seen as the environment v. the economy. He spoke of cooperative efforts involving the social sciences, science, and technology for the resolution of environmental problems in a manner that would involve all stakeholders. A White House conference is planned for December.

The second half of the day’s discussions centered on possible agendas for PCAST. Gibbons started with what he called a “shopping list” of possible areas that could be handled by the committee as a whole or subcommittees. Suggested topics included a strategic R&D priority review, the role of science and technology in global security, and sustainable development. Alluding to the long lead time in the federal budget making process, he said that any PCAST recommendations made by next March or April (a very short time) will be incorporated into the 1997 budget request.

Discussion on the second day continued to address how the committee could best spend its time. Announcing that the NSTC’s nine committees were each developing strategy papers, Gibbons suggested that a useful activity for PCAST might be forming into small groups and writing brief responses to each strategy paper. (The NSTC committees are: Health, Safety and Food R&D; Information and Communication R&D; National Security; Civilian Industrial Technology; Fundamental Science; International Science, Engineering and Technology; Environment and Natural Resources Research; Transportation R&D; and Education and Training R&D.) Another role Gibbons foresaw was responding to three reviews currently being conducted on the DOD, DOE and NASA federal laboratory systems. This, he said, was a longer-term initiative that the committee could revisit at its next meeting in February, 1995. As a third activity, Gibbons said the OSTP staff would work with the committee over time to refine the list of issues the committee had put forward as important (education, environment, investment, health, and national security), and try to identify useful tasks relating to those issues.