Creating and Supporting Science and Technology Policies with Information Systems

有许多资源是日本科学技术部门制定有效和适当政策所必需的。由于这些政策制定过程的专业性，所有“利益相关者”或行为者的积极参与是确保这些政策成功的一个重要特征。到目前为止，公民对科学和技术政策制定的参与很少，或者说是草率的。在国家核政策等敏感问题上尤其如此，在这些问题上，公民接受和参与这一进程至关重要。最近在北九州市民中进行的一项调查清楚地强调了促成这一进程的一个重要因素--使参与方充分了解这一进程的连贯一致的信息政策。结果表明，高度重视由公民自己收集和处理的信息--这些信息更容易被接受、理解和处理。政策制定的可操作性需要一个及时和一致地向公民提供动态信息的信息环境。这最好是在多媒体环境中完成的，其中基于文本的信息由图像、声音、视频等其他媒体补充。此外，利用互联网通过电子邮件和万维网提供的互动和沟通能力，是任何试图促进积极政策制定的信息系统的重要组成部分。因此，研究进程的下一阶段是开发一个综合多媒体系统，其中包括与科学和技术政策有关的关键信息的动态交流。

There are many resources that are necessary for efficient and appropriate policy for the science and technology sector in Japan. Due to the specialist nature of development processes of such policies, the active participation of all 'stakeholders' or actors is an important feature in ensuring the success of these policies.Citizens' participation in science and technology policy development has been minimal, or cursory, until now. This is especially true in the case of sensitive issues such as national nuclear policies, where citizens' acceptance and involvement in the process is critical. A survey conducted among citizens of Kitakyushu City recently clearly highlighted an important ingredient for enabling this process-a coherent and consistent information policy that keeps the participant stakeholders fully informed of the processes. It was shown that a high value is assigned to information collected and processed by the citizens themselves-it is better accepted, understood and processed.The need for operationalizing policy development is an information environment that provides dynamic information to citizens on a timely and consistent manner. This is best done in a multimedia environment where text-based information is supplemented by other media like images, sound, video etc. Also, utilizing the interactive and communicative capabilities offered by the internet, through email and the world wide web, is an important component of any information system that attempts to enable active policy development. Thus, the next stage of the research process is to develop an integrated multimedia system that incorporates such dynamic interchange of critical information related to science and technology policies.