International Workshop on Science, Technology and International Affairs: An Historical Perspective, March 2004, at Georgetown University

本次研讨会旨在汇集来自美国、欧洲和拉丁美洲的学者，他们将探讨科学和技术在国际事务中的地位，尤其是自第二次世界大战以来。它试图超越对超级大国之间的技术军备竞赛和太空竞赛的通常研究，以展示科学和技术知识的内容如何融入政策辩论，并为国际舞台上国家和权力集团之间的谈判提供信息。它将强调将决定建立在公认的真理主张基础上的必要性与这些真理主张固有的脆弱性和试探性之间的对比。虽然重大的政治倡议和政策决定理想地应该基于当今全球关注的许多领域（最明显的是全球变暖和气候变化）的“客观”知识，但证据本身是高度争议和政治化的。本次研讨会将探讨这种不确定性对政治和政策过程的意义，开启科技历史学家和社会学家、国际事务学者和政策制定者之间的对话。根据这一知识议程，PI是科学技术历史学家，而Co-PI是国际事务研究员。该项目不仅旨在促进研究人员之间的多学科互动。它还旨在接触研究生、政策制定者和管理人员。为此目的，讲习班将于2004年3月在华盛顿特区乔治敦大学当代阿拉伯研究中心举行。大约有20位知名学者已经表达了他们参与该项目的意愿，并提供了他们提出的报告的主题和摘要。将鼓励来自当地的大约15-20人，包括学生和政策领域的从业人员参加。此外，将建立一个最初由乔治华盛顿大学主办的网页，以确保促进该项目的工作和传播其成果。PI和Co-PI还将共同编辑Osiris第21卷（一本致力于科学史及其文化影响的年度研究期刊，由科学社会史出版），其中在研讨会上发表的最佳论文将于2006年出版。

This workshop aims to bring together scholars from the USA, Europe and Latin America who will explore the place of science and technology in international affairs, above all since World War II. Its seeks to go beyond the usual studies of the technological arms race and the space race between the superpowers to show how the content of scientific and technological knowledge is integrated into policy debates and informs negotiations between states and power blocs in the international arena. It will emphasize the contrast between the need to base decisions on well-established truth-claims, and the inherent fragility and tentativeness of those truth-claims. While major political initiatives and policy decisions should ideally be based on "objective" knowledge in many areas of global concern today (most obviously, global warming and climate change) the evidence is itself highly contested and politicized. This workshop will explore the significance of this uncertainty for the political and policy process, opening a dialogue between historians and sociologists of science and technology, scholars in international affairs, and policy makers themselves. In line with this intellectual agenda, the PI is an historian of science and technology, while the Co-PI is a researcher in international affairs. The project is not only intended to facilitate multidisciplinary interactions between researchers. It also aims to reach out to graduate students, policymakers and administrators. To this end the workshop will be held at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University in Washington DC in March 2004. Approximately 20 leading scholars have already expressed their willingness to participate in the project, and have provided topics and abstracts of their proposed presentations. About 15-20 additional people from the local area, including students and practitioners in the policy field, will be encouraged to participate. In addition, the promotion of the project and the dissemination of its results, will be secured by building a webpage that will originally be hosted at George Washington University. The PI and Co-PI will also co-edit Volume 21 of Osiris (an annual research journal devoted to the history of science and its cultural influences, published by the History of Science Society) in which the best papers presented at the workshop will be published in 2006.