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APPENDIX A STRUCfURING THE TASKS OF ASSE SSMENT AND RESPONSE The Panel presents here discussions of technology assessment rela tive to different foci, or starting points-technology itself, society, the environment, the individual-and to different modes of as sessment and of responses to it. The political system, which provides the frame in which any realistic analysis of technology assessment must be set, cannot be expected to react intelligently to an unstructured mass of issues and problems somehow related to implications of technological development. One of the obstacles to appropriate action is the lack of any effective structuring instrument. Even if there could be set in motion a system capable of truly comprehensive assessment and mature response, it would be necessary to decide how the energies of such a system ought to be allocated among the virtually limitless range of issues that might be brought to its attention. Without some rational way of making that sort of decision, priorities in the processes of assessment and response, as we noted in the body of this report, would tend to be set by accident or by the political muscle of interested groups rather than by the urgency of any given problem. With out effective criteria for ascribing priority to assessment issues, therefore, the system would be unlikely to focus attention on the critical questions when they are truly ripe for decision. But the evolution of such criteria will require the development of better models than can now be sum moned to the task. It will be necessary, for example, to explore alternative ways of classifying technological 122 Digitized b y Goog Ie
developments and their effects, of categorizing types of assessment and methods of response. Only with the aid of more sophisticated taxonomies for such purposes can one begin to understand the complex dynamics of the processes involved ; only through such understanding can one formulate and evaluate crucial policy alternatives. There is, of course, no unique way to break down so vast a subject into components that are at once useful and manageable. In our own deliberations, however, we have found it helpful to conceive of this complex area in terms of three interrelated "blocks" : focal points for assessment ; assessment modes and mechanisms ; patterns of response and action. PosSIBLE FocAL PoiNTS FOR AssESSMENT We have found it useful in our discussions to distin guish among assessment efforts in terms of the points in the system from which they begin : ( 1 ) technology, (2) society, (3) the environment, (4) the individual, or (5) some combination of the preceding. TECHNOLOGY The first general approach begins from a particular technology or cluster of interrelated technologies and seeks to explore the possible consequences of contem plated, ongoing, or alternative trends in the area under consideration. In this context a technology is thought of as more than hardware. It is perceived as a system of interrel ated innovations, some technical and some social, which comprise some sort of coherent nexus pertaining to the systematic manipulation of the environment. From this standpoint, for example, "the automobile" would include the manufacturing process, the system of dealers and service stations, the highway program, urban traffic control personnel and facilities, relevant rules and principles of tort law, liability insurance 123 Digitized by Goog Ie
schemes, and so on . In terms of the distinction made in the introductory chapter, the focal point for assessment within this mode might thus be either some component of the technology or some component of its supporting system. Assessments focusing on technology might be further sub-classified in a wide variety of ways. With respect to supporting systems, for example, a distinction might be drawn between (a) assessments that focus upon the economic, social, or legal arrangements facilitating the introduction, acceptance, distribution, or use of a technology (for example, foreign-aid programs sup porting agricultural or hydroelectric technologies in developing nations ; or community health-care-delivery systems ; or governmentally supported medical insurance ; or community-antenna television systems (CA1V) ; or municipal fluoridation of water) , and (b) assessments that focus upon the arrangements that constrain such introduction or use, impose obligations upon the user with respect to compensating injured persons, or other wise seek to overcome the potentially deleterious con sequences of uninhibited application (for example, licensing the use of radio-isotopes ; or requiring judicial warrants as a prerequisite to lawful electronic eaves dropping ; or compelling prior registration and approval of new drugs ; or requiring batch-testing of antibiotics ; or imposing a tax on environment-deteriorating activi ties ; or enforcing air and water quality standards at the source) . With respect to technological systems, a distinction might be made among (a) those assessments that focus on the advance of a technology from the earlier stages of research and development to the later stages of intro duction (for example, an evaluation of current progress in weather-modification technology) ; (b) those that focus on the transfer of a technology from one area of 1 24 Digitized by Goog Ie
application to another (for example, adoption of mili tary j et engines for civilian use ; or application of satellite surveillance to earth resources ; or use of particle accelerators for cancer therapy or food preservation) ; and (c) those that focus on growth in the scale of a given application (for example, proliferation of DDT or of tetraethyl lead antiknock compounds ; or wider usage of oral contraceptives ; or growing sizes of oil tankers or trucks) . Distinctions for assessment purposes might also be drawn in terms of the availability of intermediaries or buffers between the technology and its users-as in the case of medicine, where doctors and hospitals act as intermediaries in the use of prescription drugs ; or in the case of construction, where architects may serve as intermediaries for at least some new techniques. In many situations, the availability of such int�rmediaries, as assessors in their own right, might make govern mental intervention somewhat less urgent. Yet the proliferation of choices open to professionals makes individual assessment less and less reliable, a fact that accounts for the need to interpose the Food and Drug Administration between the drug manufacturer and the physician or hospital, or the building inspector between the supplier of building materials or equipment and the architect. Or technological developments might be distinguished in terms of expected lead-times (computer-aided instruc tion or organ transplants, for example, have shorter lead-times than, say, repair of genetic defects) or in terms of how radical a departure they seem to represent, noting (as we have earlier) that it is particularly impor tant to beware of false analogies with predecessor technologies. Technological developments might also be categorized in terms of visibility. For such purposes, it would be 1 25 Digitized by Goog Ie
important to determine to what extent the dimensions of a given development are exposed to public scrutiny rather than either deliberately concealed ( as in the case, for example, of many military proj ects) or difficult to discern because of their dependence upon uncon troversial, incremental decisions made by a multitude of diverse investors or innovators ( J) . A distinct but related classification might be made in terms of economic concentration of producers (though not necessarily of consumers) . In a number of areas, such as power reactors, j et aircraft, large-scale weather modifica tion, or space communications, technology is character ized by a few massive applications, usually supported in their earlier stages with public funds involving fairly explicit political decisions. Although market forces even tually tend to take over as any technology matures witness, for example, satellite communications and power reactors-highly concentrated investment at the outset may make it easier for comprehensive and timely assessments to be made and for their results to prove influential than in cases in which the original investments are made in such small packages and are so widely dispersed that no comparable "handle" is initially available, requiring one to rely on less direct methods of control . With respect, for example, to automobiles, television, transistors, computers, or agricultural ma chinery, one begins to notice significant effects only after widespread introduction and use . In such areas, more over, application is ordinarily governed from the outset less by collective action than by individual market decisions not readily subject to political control. Even in such areas, of course, government action may alter the incentive structure, and public decisions (for example, highway construction in the case of the automobile ; licensing and frequency allocation in the case of tele vision ; fall-out from public investment in military and 1 26 Digitized by Goog Ie
space technology in the case of transistors and computers ; public investment in agricultural research, the extension program, and price supports in the case of farming) strongly influence the evolution of technology. Although the distinction between technologies with intensive economic concentration and those in which investment tends to be more diffuse is thus not as sharp as might at first appear, it seems useful nonetheless to note the difference for assessment purposes. Perhaps a more basic phenomenon requiring explora tion is the degree to which the decision-making processes influencing a given technological development are centralized and hence subject to explicit collective control . The primary relevance of economic concentration for our purposes is that it tends to assure such centralization in the early stages of technological development. Sus ceptibility to public control, however, may often be more a function of visibility than of centralization or economic concentration . The area of organ transplant technology, for example, is sufficiently "open" that public policy can make itself felt directly, despite the fact that activity and investment in that area are widely dispersed and anything but intensively centralized . For purposes of classification it may be useful also to remember that the course of a technological develop ment and the difficulties of its assessment and control depend strongly upon where it originates, what forces generate it (domestic profit motive versus concern for national power or prestige, for example) , its competitive environment, and the sources of resistance to its advance political, social, legal, economic, or religious (for example, the pill) . As we have already noted, it is difficult to generalize about where vested interests will be aligned with respect to a new technology. Often those interests press for the adoption of technology ; not infrequently, however, they oppose it. Failure to develop 1 27 Digitized by Goog Ie
needed technology, as in low-cost housing, traffic control, or high-speed ground transport, is often the consequence of vested interests having accumulated around the con tinuation of older ways of doing things. It might, indeed, be useful to classify technological developments with respect to the relative power and cohesiveness of their proponents and opponents, respectively, and of such third parties as have become (or may become) involved in the decisions that will influence their evolution. Although the following classification partly overlaps several of those previously suggested, the panel has found it useful to separate those technological developments that are very substantially influenced by federal activity, either supportive or restrictive, from those with little or no immediate federal involvement. Federal responsi bility for assessment and control seems clearer in the former areas ; opposition in the private sector to such assessment and control is likely to be less intense ; and the ease with which it is possible to minimize the undesir able secondary consequences of a new assessment activity is surely greater in situations in which a federal "handle" is already present. Because of the dominance of the private market it is easy to forget the crucial role played by federal actions and policies in the development of such technologies as automobiles, television, and air transport. Thus the federal "handle" is much larger than is often thought. An attempt might finally be made to classify technol ogies in functional or operational terms that facilitate generalization about the ease with which they can be assessed or regulated . Thus, for example, technologies might be classified according to their operation as ways of either transforming, transporting, or preserving either matter, energy, people, information, or some other aspect of the environment (2) . An effort could then be made to classify the kinds of effects characteristically associated 1 28 Digitized by Goog Ie
with each of these categories. Perhaps a classification in terms of the characteristics of the relevant industry rather than the intrinsic characteristics of the technology would be useful. In both the communications and energy industries, for example, the time horizon for planning is relatively long and government regulation is especially influential. These characteristics tend to facilitate more thorough and critical assessment, as does the fact that these industries sell functions rather than products and are thus better equipped to exam�ne alternative technologies to achieve parallel purposes. SOCIETY An entirely different focal point for technology assess ment is suggested by the social-indicators movement and by related attempts to enhance our sensitivity to, and understanding of, social change. Thus, it is possible to start from a given social system (for example, housing, transportation, production, marketing, education, com munication, recreation) , or from some kind of social relationship (for example, employment, marriage, family, property) , or from some broad distributive category (for example, residential patterns, composition of the j ob market, allocations of power and resources, class struc ture, income distribution) , or from some other social aggregate (for example, population, trade balance, gross national product, military strength) and explore how the area in question might be affected by the growth and spread of various alternative technologies, including the synergistic effects among several technologies or between technologies and social or political trends. Given the limited state of present understanding of social systems and human behavior, there is little likeli hood that such explorations would lead to convincing, long-range assessments of the impact of various develop ments on society. But in many areas it may be possible 1 29 Digitized by Goog Ie
to anticipate the medium-range societal impacts with enough confidence to make the effort worth while, at least when more has been learned about the ways in which technological change induces social change. New technology opens new opportunities and lessens existing constraints on human activities ; simultaneously, it generates problems for individuals, groups, and institutions as the new opportunities are exploited. The interactions are often distressingly complex. As a recent study has suggested, for example, "improved transpor tation technology and increased ownership of private automobiles have increased the mobility of businesses and individuals. This has led to altered patterns of industrial and residential location, so that older unified cities are being increasingly transformed into larger metropolitan complexes. The new opportunities for mobility are largely denied to the poor and black popu lations of the core cities, however, partly for economic reasons, and partly as a result of restrictions on choice of residence by Negroes, thus leading to persistent Negro unemployment despite a generally high level of economic activity. Cities are thus increasingly unable to perform their traditional functions of providing employment opportunities for all segments of their populations and an integrated social environment that can temper ethnic and racial differences. * * * The resulting in stability is further aggravated by modern communica tions technology, which heightens the expectations of the poor and the fears of the well-to-do and adds frustration and bitterness to the urban crisis" (3) despite the long term hope that improved communication networks might eventually alleviate some of the problems caused by improved transportation systems through providing practical alternatives to physical meetings. Clearly, if understanding of phenomena as complex as these is to be acquired in time for effective action, 1 30 Digitized by Goog Ie
available mcxlels of the mechanisms through which technology impinges upon society must be greatly improved. One step in the development of improved mcxlels, it would seem, will be precisely the attempt to organize at least some technology-assessment activities around the themes provided by social patterns and problems, rather than focusing exclusively upon tech nology itself as the central theme for assessment. THE ENVIRONMENT Yet another possible focal point for assessment is provided by the theme of "environmental quality. " Thus i t might b e useful t o begin with some segment of the physical environment-a particular resource ( "clean" air, "clean" water, and so on) or an ecological obj ective, either abiotic or biotic-and then explore how such resources or goals might be influenced by possible technological developments and by alternative techno logical applications. It might be instructive, for example, to look at specific estuarine zones or at wilderness areas and ask how they will be affected by various liquid and solid industrial waste-disposal techniques, by proposed recreational or commercial uses, by contemplated high way programs, and so on . Or it might be interesting to focus on a broad environmental resource-the lower atmosphere, for instance-and attempt to monitor and forecast changes in its behavior and quality, whether due to technological applications or to other causes, as does the Environmental Science Services Administration (ESSA) in the Commerce Department. In support of such efforts, environmental consequences might be divided among (a) those that are primarily aesthetic (noise levels, smells, atmospheric clarity, scenic degradation, and so on) ; (b) those that affect entire ecosystems (changes in species balance, water eutroph ication , and the like) ; and (c) those that are basically 131 36-973 �69---- 1 0 Digitized by GoogIe
biomedical, though too low in intensity to have other than possible long-term effects upon individual physi ology or psychology (lead salts in the atmosphere or other kinds of low-toxicity trace residues, for instance) (4) . Or a distinction might be drawn between (a) environ men tal contamination that can usefully be described in terms of residuals (of unrecycled energy outpu ts, solid or liquid byproducts, radioactive wastes, and so on) , and (b) more systemic environmental problems (urban congestion, unsightly billboards and buildings, and so on ) . It should not too readily be assumed, however, that the notion of "environmental quality," even when augmented by extensive taxonomic efforts, can itself provide a very useful focus for thinking about assessment problems. Any concept that includes concerns as wide ranging as solid-waste disposal, occupational hygiene, highway beautification, mental health, urban design, vector control, and smog prevention may be too broad to be operational. This does not mean, of course, that the mounting public concern with "environmental problems" can contribute nothing to technology-assess ment activities. It means simply that, pending further attention to definitional and other basic matters, the contemporary interest in environmental issues will make its major contribution to technology assessment by pro viding impetus for action rather than by furnishing such action with an organizational focus. THE INDIVIDUAL Finally, assessment efforts might be organized around effects on the life experience of the individual-the development and socialization of the child in a world of mass media and rapid communication ; the work experience of the adult and his perception of himself in relation to technological change ; his access to material goods, to solitude, to human companionship and inti- 1 32 Digitized byGoogle
macy ; his participation in decisions that affect his well-being ; his mental health ; his life expectancy ; his exposure to risks of accident and injury. Assessment activity structured in this way could be truly useful only if one had a workable classification of the diversity of interests and roles of individuals, so that the impact of a variety of technologies on specific roles could be systematically studied. It appears difficult in general to give this mode of assessment sufficient focus to provide a worthwhile basis for public decisions with respect to technology. Nevertheless, some exploratory work along such lines may be of value in identifying new problem areas for more specifically technological study. An example is suggested by recent investigations of the impact, actual and potential, of various electronic techniques and data-handling systems upon individual privacy, and the new technological means that modern electronics might offer to increase the protection of such privacy-for example, by controlling access to data files. Another illustration might be a study attempting to identify all the kinds of trace elements in the environ ment to which an individual might be exposed in his lifetime and to study the combined effects of such cumulative exposure on his health. MIXED A blend of the approaches sketched above seems necessary. Efforts that start from particular technological developments and work outward, for example, might overlook wide circles of systems effects that cannot readily be associated with any single technology. As the panel has already observed, technical innovations and their applications generate spiraling chains of derivative consequences, often dispersed in many directions and often conYerging with consequences originating from very distant sources. One need only witness the cluster 133 Digitized b y Goog Ie
of technological developments and social policies that converged to produce the migration to megalopolis and the decay of the central city (5) to realize that assess ments centered on particular technological develop ments might miss important cumulative effects, often synergistic ones, which in the end may determine the character of the resulting problem. Even with respect to the biology of a single individual, it is a common place that various agents may interact to produce cumulative consequences that are in no sense limited to the sum of their individual components. Such synergistic possibilities must be carefully ex plored, but they can never be explored adequately by a sequence of assessment mechanisms, each of which is geared simply to the evaluation of a single line of technological development, unless the assessments are somehow linked within a broader framework capable of evaluating each technology as part of a whole system of activities, perhaps functionally unrelated, contributing to certain kinds of effects. For example, mere competition for use of various parts of the environment may produce unfortunate effects that no one use or sum of uses could . account for. Traffic problems and overcrowding are of this character. Similarly, pollution effects-lake eutroph ication, for example-are often non-linear with respect to environmental load, involving a threshold beyond which deterioration becomes much more rapid and self reinforcing. It is critical to be especially alert to potential triggering mechanisms associated with quantitative changes in environmental or sociological or psychological burdens. Assessments centered on specific technological applications are subj ect to important shortcomings with respect to such synergistic phenomena. The other three approaches, starting from society or the environment or the individual and then working back to technological developments that might be ex- 1 34 Digitized by Goog Ie
pected to impinge upon the areas being explored, do not share this basic defect and are better suited to the investigation of interacting and synergistic consequences. Each of these approaches, however, has defects of its own which are not shared by the first. Assessment efforts that begin from a segment of society or of the environ ment may overlook new technologies altogether, or may at least overlook alternative technologies and those that might alleviate the societal or environmental defects of a technology that has been identified as significant. Moreover, starting from a sector of society or an interest or role of the individual may make it especially difficult to separate the role of technology from that of social trends or policies. Finally, starting from the individual heightens the already serious problem of weighing "social benefits" against personal risks or injuries. Thus it seems that some elements of all four approaches are required . Indeed, it may well be that in some areas the focal point for assessment should not fall into any of these areas, but should straddle them in an appropriate way. For example, a project or policy that raises a number of technological as well as non-technological issues may be proposed, calling for a "systems assessment" that cannot be pressed into any of . the above categories. E F FECT-ORIENTED A SSE SSMENT IN GENERAL It is important to recognize that effects may be cate gorized in many ways other than those suggested by the social-environmental-individual categorization employed above . It is possible, for example, to distinguish those effects of technology that result from the availability of new options from those that result from the exercise of such options. The former are often overlooked . For example, the ready availability of birth control tech niques, whether or not broadly employed, might have the effect of reducing the acceptability of therapeutic 1 35 D igitized by GoogIe
abortion . Or the availability of nuclear power may alter the location-price structure of conventional power and thus affect industrial location and labor migration even when not heavily applied. In examining the effects of technological change associated with the exercise or non-exercise of the possi bilities it creates, the panel has, of course, distinguished between intended effects (such as more efficient pro duction) and those that are unintended (such as a greater number of industrial accidents, or noisier air ports) . The panel has also distinguished effects that are essentially direct from those that are truly derivative. The latter are often the most important, and their meaningful classifica�ion, of course, is very difficult. An effect might be called "derivative" if the chain connecting it to its technological "cause" contains a large number of manipulable, reversible, or avoidable links ; or if it is the result of the confluence of several distinct "causes" ; or if it flows not so much from the exercise of the tech nological option as from the options that are foreclosed or made more costly by such exercise (opportunity costs) . In this connection it is important to keep in mind that the very act of exploiting some opportunities often makes it impossible, or at least more costly, to exploit others. A lake polluted with industrial effluents may be unavailable for recreational use ; soil cultivated for one crop may become unavailable for another ; the commitment to faster transportation or better communi cation may ultimately foreclose options of solitude and stability. In relation to both the natural environment and the social environment, such "opportunity costs" are extremely important in the total picture of higher order consequences of technological application . In general, the panel believes that more thought must be given to the various ways in which such higher-order 1 36 Digitized by Goog Ie
consequences may be generated by technological developments (6). Another important distinction recurring in the panel's discussions has involved effects upon the primary benefi ciaries of a technology versus effects upon more remote individuals - non-users, who are not parties to the "tech nological transaction . " The assessment and control of effects upon primary beneficiaries, by institutions such as the Food and Drug Administration, is far simpler, of course, than the assessment and control of non-user effects. The panel has also drawn a distinction between short-range effects and those that make themselves felt over longer periods of time, often in a cumulative way. The latter, as we have observed, are generally harder to forecast, and harder to inject into the decision-making process, however smoothly the system may function with respect to structural externality. The panel has dis tinguished between deterministic effects and those that are basically statistical. Most important effects are probably of the latter variety and are correspondingly difficult to dramatize, as the experience with cigarettes, lung cancer, and cardiovascular diseases makes painfully clear. Effects on identifiable groups have been distinguished from those of a more di.ffuse character-effects on ecological systems, life patterns, values, and so on . With respect to securing adequate representation of diverse interests in assessment and decision-making processes, the panel has noted that the greatest diffi culties arise in dealing with the most diffuse effects those by which many persons are injured or benefited slightly · as against those by which a few are affected more intensely. Obvious, but no less important, are the scope of antici pated effects, the time and expense needed to appraise or alter them, and, most critical of all, their reversibility. 137 Digitized b y Goog Ie
Changes in population, life expectancy, intensity of land utilization, consumption of fossil fuels or other exhaust ible resources ; modifications in topography (whether deliberate or inadvertent) , including erosion, delta for mation, silting ; reduction in species diversity-effects such as these may be partially or wholly irreversible and thus are far more important for assessment purposes than are effects that can be reversed without inordinate difficulty or with the application of new technology in the future. It is important, however, not to treat a consequence as irreversible simply because it resists purposeful modification. Although the cumulative effects of environmental contamination by certain toxic or radioactive substances, for example, are difficult to re verse by deliberate means, some of these effects tend to decrease quite rapidly with time and thus cannot be deemed truly irreversible. Such considerations are par ticularly important in deciding the urgency of a given issue for purposes of assessment or response. Finally, effects that are essentially inherent in the technology should he distinguished from those that flow only from technological abuse. In the former category, for example, one must probably place the sonic boom from supersonic transport. The telephone network, in contrast, presents quite different problems, since its most serious harms flow from abuse (wiretapping) rather than from any intrinsic technical characteristic, and can be largely avoided by those who are willing to make only limited and guarded use of the telephone. More generally, one must distinguish between technological effects that can be dealt with at the option of the individual user-for instance, protection of privacy by the use of unlisted numbers and those that must be dealt with by a system modification for which all users must pay, such as an aircraft blind- landing system. 1 38 Digitized by Goog Ie
PossiBLE AssESSMENT MoDE S AND MEcHANISMS Implicit in much of this report has been the distinction between internalized assessment-that is, assessment built into the incentive structure of the decision-making process in question-and externalized assessment-that is, assessment conducted by an institution deliberately separated from the front-line decision-maker. There has been general agreement in the panel that internalized assessment, whenever it can be applied, is far preferable, essentially because self-regulating ( "closed-loop") sys tems are best able to adjust to net variations within the systems themselves. Externalized assessment, like any form �f absentee management, tends to separate au thority from responsibility, while internalized assessment tends to redefine responsibility without separating it from authority. However, self-regulating systems may be insensitive to externalities and may have to be supple mented by externalized ( "open-loop") assessment. Thus, although there are advantages to being on the scene, proximity and commitment tend to generate blind spots. In sum, any scheme devised for improving the assess ment and management of technological change should make maximum possible use of internal decision making processes and should proceed by making those processes more sensitive rather than by imposing external constraints, but should recognize the necessity for some external assessment and supervision to make the system function properly. Ideally, the effort should be to modif y goals and criteria of success without dictating the means of achieving them. In classifying assessment modes and mechanisms, it is possible to look at the places from which the start, which y we have done above in exploring possible focal points for assessment. It is possible also to look at their time perspective-distinguishing those that are basically antic ipator from those that are engaged in continuous monitoring y 1 39 Digitized by Goog Ie
or those whose primary obligations center upon periodic reevaluation. For a great many reasons, in part because ob jectives and values change, all three are needed. The evolution of technology is dynamic. To be comprehensive, assessment requires an occasional snapshot of a large system at a moment in time, but to be responsive to change it must provide a continuous movie as well. The panel has had occasion to distinguish between negative assessment-that is, assessment by an agency designed primarily to criticize new technology (the Food and Drug Administration, for example)-and positive assessment-that is, assessment by an agency responsible for exploring the value and feasibility of promoting new . technology (for example, the Atomic Energy Commis sion, the Public Health Service, or the Department of Agriculture) . Each assessment mode, as we have noted, has its characteristic weaknesses, the negative tending to be unduly conservative and the positive overly pro motional. The solution the panel has urged is a second-order assessment activity performed b an entity with neither promo y tional tasks nor risk-preventing responsibilities, an entity ancillary to the activities of all agencies with one or the other kind of bias. Another type of distinction might be made according to the extent to which deliberate public action is envi sioned to influence the direction of technological change. Three distinct approaches are projective assessment, evaluative assessment, and directive assessment. In the first, which most closely resembles technological forecasting, possible alternatives for the future evolution of technology are analyzed to discern the most likely pattern of evolution and to specify probable margins of error. Any such projection, of course, requires an evaluation of the effects of society (that is, market and political influence) upon technology as well as an assess- 1 40 Digitized by Goog Ie
ment of the effects of technology upon society and the environment. The second mode, evaluative assessment, most closely resembles systems analysis. I t entails the study of existing or proposed programs with highly technological content to determine their internal goals and assumptions ; to assess the degree to which the projected efforts are likely to achieve their stated goals ; and, ultimately, to evaluate the desirability of the goals themselves, taking into account possible deleterious side-effects. The third· mode, directive assessment, is less neutral and more action-oriented than either of the first two. In this mode, the emphasis is upon studying how technology may be directed, or how alternative possibilities may be selected, so as to maximize identified beneficial effects and minimize specified deleterious side-effects. Such an evaluation must include a study of possible alterations in market and political incentives and institutions so as to channel technology into beneficial directions in a more or less self-regulating manner. Assessment activities might finally be distinguished relative to the institutional settings in which they occur : in the private firm; in a mission-oriented agenc such as the y Department of Defense or Transportaticn or the National Science Foundation (with respect to weather modifica tion) ; in an environmental-regulation agenc such as the y Federal Water PoJlution Control Administration or the Atomic Energy Commission (with respect to radio isotope usage, radioactive-waste disposal, or power reactor siting) ; in consumer-protection agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration or the Federal Trade Commission ; in resource-allocation agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission, the Federal Power Commission, or the Federal Aviation Agency (with respect to SST) ; in professional societies such as the American Society for Testing and Materials ; m quasi- 141 oi9,tized by Google
independent groups such as the National Research Council ; by congressional committee sta J· by Congress-wide bodies ifs such as the Legislative Reference Service or the General Accounting Office ; in executive planning or coordinating entities such as the Office of Science and Technology, the President's Science Advisory Committee, the Federal Council on Science and Technology, or the Environ mental Quality Council ; or in ad hoc bodies such as the Telecommunications Task Force. PossmLE PATTERN S oF RE sPONSE TO AssE SSMENT There are, of course, many ways to classify the uses of assessment and the kinds of actions that can be taken in response to it. It is possible, for example, to classify responses according to the point o intervention in the f technological time scale from initial innovation to wide spread diffusion. Or responses directed at technologies might be distinguished from responses directed at supporting systems. A basic set of distinctions may be made in terms of the change that is ultimately sought-namely, total abstention (no change at all) ; or selection of a dijferent or modified technology; or modification of the introduction of a given technology (by altering the supporting system in some way) ; or alteration of some facet of the environment, natural or social, with which the technology may even tually be expected to interact (either through further technology, or through law, or through education) . In a sense, these are the possible ends of assessment ; but attention must be directed to means as well. In classifying the means by which assessments might be made to serve various ends, two basic questions can be identified : First: Who is to take the initial post-assessment action : Congress? the Executive? an agency? a court? the mass media? a professional association? technological 142 Digitized byGoogle
innovators themselves? Assessments, of course, may serve as bases for formal legislative or executive actions of various kinds, but their influence may also be felt in more subtle ways, as through public pressure upon, and criticism · of, industrial or individual practices (for ex ample, trash burning) . It is easy to forget the extent to which even the most profit-minded entrepreneurial activity is influenced by social attitudes conveyed through the media or by the climate of opinion among people with whom businessmen come in contact. Even if no formal action is taken by any public agency· as a result of a given technological assessment, therefore, it should not be assumed that the assessment will have no influence on decision-making processes. Indeed, assess ment may be structured specifically to provide a frame work for indirectly influencing decision-making by disseminating widely certain kinds of information or evaluation for use either by private groups or as an authoritative data base for future legal action. To some extent, the information responsibilities assigned to the Atomic Energy Commission and to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to encourage industry to adopt innovations generated by federal research and development in these agencies are of this character, as are the extension activities of the Depart ment of Agriculture and the Soil Conservation Service. Second: In the event that some kind of governmental action is to be taken in response to assessment, it becomes important to ask what form such action is to take. Too little is known about the ways in which laws and adminis trative policies channel the directions of technological change to attempt an exhaustive classification of all possible answers, but several major alternatives have been identified by the panel : I . Assessment may provide a basis for resource-allocation decisions in the public sector, including but not limited to 1 43 Digitized by Goog Ie
allocations for research and development. Thus, in response to a given assessment, the federal government may abandon or alter its support for a major tech nological project that it might otherwise have promoted ; or it may increase its investment (either directly or by sharing risks, as in the Price-Anderson Act (7)) in a technology (either developing or already available) to alleviate unwanted secondary effects or to achieve desired primary objectives ; or it may augment its support for basic research and development as a prelude to deeper assessment in some area ; or it may invest in the establishment of a monitoring system designed to detect and evaluate the low-level effects of technologies, whether governmentally supported or otherwise, in the early stages of their introduction ; or it may partially subsidize private efforts to undertake the needed research or monitoring in a given area ; or it may alter the form of an existing subsidy ; or it may expend funds to com pensate, relocate, or rehabilitate groups injured by technological change. 2. Governmental response to assessment may take the form of legislative or administrative action modif ing y private initiatives by internalizing costs or en forcing specific requirements-as in the case of automotive safety standards, food and drug laws, or other consumer legislation. A critical issue, to which the panel has already referred� involves the choice between administering direct rules of conduct and readjusting the legal environment differ ently. Thus, it might be made advantageous for the affected parties to alter their behavior of their own accord-for example, by facilitating collective litigation to bring costs home to the persons responsible for creating diffuse injuries, or by enacting legislation to create either negative or positive financial incentives, such as economic penalties assessed against polluting· 1 44 Digitized b y Goog Ie
activities, or tax credits or public subsidies conferred upon activities which reduce pollution. When outrage over an insult to the environment becomes acute, it is tempting to castigate the offenders and to establish control over their future through some sort of regulatory commission . Such commissions may on occasion provide the best answer, but the history of regulation has not always been a happy one. On the one hand, even with the best of motives, the gradual accom modations between the regulatory agency and the inter ests it is supposed to regulate may leave little regulation intact. On the other hand, regulatory agencies may tend to invade industrial responsibilities for detailed decisions, and thus gradually erode the initiative and sense of responsibility of corporate management. More over, and quite apart from these twin difficulties, technical regulatory activities rarely attract the most able and imaginative personnel, with the result that technical obsolescence is often the fate of rules and regulations, which are difficult enough even with the best of personnel to accommodate to a rapidly changing technological context. 3. It is important to note the possibility of altering incentives other than by imposing penalties or awarding subsidies. It is theoretically possible, for example, to create legal property rights in a shared resource like air or water, though this is sometimes bound to prove difficult. Another alternative is to internalize side-effects within the compass of wider units of decision-making. The sanitation authority of a community that discharges untreated sewage to a river, for example, may be merged with the water supply authority of a nearby community that uses the same river downstream as a source of supply ; the new and larger authority thus created is 1 45 Digitized by Goog Ie
more likely to take into account the damaging effects of one of its functions on another. The panel's efforts in this section to classify the many kinds of responses that technology assessments might trigger, and indeed all of the taxonomic materials con tained in this appendix, should be viewed as our tentative contributions to what we hope will soon become a sustained and serious effort, in many centers of scholar ship and inquiry, to impose a greater measure of order upon the issues encompassed by the exceedingly broad notion of "technology assessment," to the end that such issues might be better understood and, ultimately, more wisely resolved . 1 46 Digitized by Goog Ie
REFERENCES AND NOTES TO APPENDIX A 1 . Recall the "tyranny of small decisions," referred to in Alfred E. Kahn, "The Tyranny of Small Decisions : Market Failures, Imperfections, and the Limits of Economics," KrKLOS: International Reoiew j11r Social Sciences, 19, 23 ff. (Fasc. I , 1 966 ) . 2. See Emmanuel G. Mesthene, " A n Experiment i n Understanding : Th e Harvard Program, Two Years After," Technology and Culture, 7, 475, 480 (Fall, 1 966 ). 3. Emmanuel G. Mesthene, "The Role of Technology in Society : Some General Implications of the Program's Research," in Harvard University Program on Technology and Society, Fourth Annual Rep��rt, 1967-1968, Cambridge, Mass . , 46 ( 1 968 ), describing a study by John R. Meyer and John F. Kain, ibid, 8-1 I . 4. One panel member, Edward C. Creutz, prepared a most instructive report in this connection, Trll&e Element Contamination of the Enoironmmt-can pated? (October The E;ffects Be Antici 1 1 , 1 968 ). On file at the National Academy of Sciences. 5. See the discussion supra, pp. 44-45, 1 30. See also fn. 3, supra, and John F. Kain and Joseph J. Persky, "Alternatives to the Gilded Ghetto," The Publie Interest, no.1 4, 75 (Winter, 1 969). 6. For a fuller discussion of the mat�ers touched uPc>n in this paragraph and the preceding one, see Emmanuel G. Mesthene, "How Technology Will Shape the Future," Science, 161, 1 35 ff. (July 1 2, 1 968 ). 7. 7 1 Stat. 576 ( 1 957). 30-973 �9 - 11 147 Digitized by Goog Ie
