The Six Modes of Social Control Based on a book used by our professor

2.  CHAPTER 14
 Popular arguments used to defend and
oppose SCOST
 Six most Influential Forms of SCOST

4. Justification
• Unprecedented magnitude of the
potential effects or consequences of
some modern scientific or technological
innovations.
Rebuttal
• Firms are responsible for any loss.

5. Justification
• Importance of fostering freedom in the
form of voluntary consumer choices.
Rebuttal
• Concerned citizens can obtain all pertinent
information if they but make effort.

6. Justification
• So much contemporary scientific and
technological activity is funded, in whole or in
part, with government money, a significant part
of which is ultimately derived from the
taxpaying public.
Rebuttal
• If technically knowledgeable researchers were
given total control over the allocation of
government funding, better technical
outcomes would result.

8. 1. Government Regulation
Watershed- government regulation of
scientific and technological activities in the
private sector is a permanent feature of the
landscapes of Western industrial societies.
19th century- advent of the high-pressure steam
boat that gave rise to the 1st restrictive
government regulation of a sector of private
industry
Between 1816 and 1851- 235 steamboats
exploded (many on Mississippi River) losing 3,000
lives.

9. Steamboat Explosion in Mississippi

10. Current Situation- 1852 law gave rise to
the first of the many government regulatory
agencies and positive regulatory activities. Thus,
employing 112,300 people fulltime at a cost of
almost $9 billion.
An Important Recent Case- Proliferation
of government regulation was making American
business less competitive. Ronald Reagan made
“regulatory relief” his new economic program,
ensuring cost-benefit-risk analysis bulked larger in
the formulation and adoption of government
regulations.

11. Outstanding Issues- executive agencies
are subject to periodic politicization.
In the early and mid 1980s an effort was made
to remove or reduce regulatory restraints on
business (due to a business-oriented
president).
“Primary role of government:
Increase industrial activity and
profits or to protect workers and
the public?”

12. 2. GOVERNMENT FUNDING AND
PERFORMANCE
OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Watershed- research and
development effort to build an atomic bomb
(The Manhattan Project). The A-bomb effort
was a watershed episode in SCOST in two
ways:
1. National defense
2. Federal government’s assuming a
controlling position vis-à-vis basic
scientific research in the postwar era.

14. Current Situation (With regards to funding) - Amount
spent on research and development work in 1989 is $ 130.8 billion.
Three fifths of the money expended in academia in basic research
Recent Important Cases of
Government Funding of Science and
Technology-
Two most important government research and development:
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) or the “Star Wars” project
Space Transportation System or the “Space Shuttle” project
These are devoted to developing a space-based weapon system
and to develop a means of routinizing transportation of people
and cargo between earth and a future space station.

15. Stars Wars Project
Space Shuttle Project

16. Outstanding Issues and Problems
Skewing effect of the Big Science and Technology
trend on American research and development
The lack of a coherent, carefully prioritized
government science and technology policy
Exceedingly costly Big Science and Technology
projects:
• Space Station ($13-$30 billion)
• Superconducting supercollider ($4-$6 billion)
• Hypersonic jet aircraft ($3-$12 billion)
• 15-year to sequence human genome ($3 billion)
• Test Reactor ($1 billion)

17. Funding such megaprojects has the
effect of denying capital funding to less visible,
less grandiose small projects.
“Science in the U.S. is dying of gigantism… big
projects are the worst way to arrive at basic
discoveries.”
- Philip Anderson (Nobel laureate)

18. Nondefense-related research and
development
• Federal republic of Germany (1986)- 2.6 %
• Japan (1985)- 2.75%
• United States (1987)- 1.88%
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
Germany Japan United
States
Development Fund
Development Fund

19. 3. Product Liability Litigation
Watershed- product in question, under certain
conditions its producers can be found liable for
distributing or installing it and can be made to pay
compensatory and, possibly, punitive damages.
Manufacturer can be found liable for one of its products:
 Negligence
 Breach warranty
 Misinterpretation
 Strict liability

20. Current Situation- product liability suits
filed in U.S. federal courts have proliferated in
recent years
1975 1985
1,579 13,554
Recent Noteworthy Cases
1. Dalkon Shield intrauterine birth control device
(IUD)- Between 1971 and 1974, 2.7 million
American women purchased
Many suffered infertility, birth defects,
spontaneous abortions, traumatic infections and
20 deaths attributed to the Dalkon IUD.

22. 2. Grimshaw v. Ford Motor Co.- a California jury
awarded a plaintiff $127.8 million in damges
against Ford “as a result of an accident caused
when 1972 Ford Pinto stalled on a freeway and
was hit from behind by another car. The gas
tank exploded and the Pinto burned, killing
the driver and seriously injuring her passenger.

23. Outstanding Issues and Problems-
difficulty of establishing the causes of certain
harms suffered by humans.
Ex.
• Case of Agent Orange (1984)- an herbicidal
defoliant containing dioxin. The suit ended in a
$180 million out-of-court settlement.
• Case of diethylstilbestrol (DES)- an FDA-
approved drug to prevent miscarriage. DES is
held responsible for over 300 cases of cancer in
“DES daughters”.

24. Due to the DES case of Sindell v. Abbott
Laboratories, “market share doctrine of
product liability” was promulgated by the
court.

25. 4. Mechanisms for Environmental
and Technological Assessment
Watershed- in the closing years of the
war in Vietnam, NEPA was passed in the
Congress to “declare a national policy which
will encourage productive and enjoyable
harmony between man and his environment.”
This mandated prospective analysis is
referred as Environmental Impact Statements
(EIS).

26. Current Situation- the Office of the
Technology Assessment (OTA) is on controversial
topics that the executive branch no longer
monopolizes the terms of technical information
sources feeding into government debates on
such issues via release of the position papers
generated by its own agencies.
Recent Noteworthy Cases- 10-year
struggle over the project along the west side of
Manhattan Island (1974). 11th year was the
revocation of the project because of its effect on
the river’s striped bass population.

27. Outstanding Issues and Problems-
EIS has the problem in the case of regulation.

28. 5. Public Participation
Watersheds-citizens have been asked to approve or
disapprove of the start-up, continuation, expansion, or restriction
either of nuclear power in general or of particular facilities.
Current Situation and Noteworthy Recent Cases- two
things are striking about this citizen-initiative exercise in SCOST.
1. Control is exercised by shifting the burden of proof from
“innocent until proven guilty” to “guilty until proven
innocent”.
2. Implementation of the law and the degree to which it
imposes a burden on commerce will depend critically on the
precise operational meanings given to vague phrases such as
“clear and reasonable warnings” and “no significant risk”.

29. Outstanding Unresolved Issues and
Problems- effectively “buy” the desired
outcomes of private parties and voters are
called upon to simply vote “yes” or “no”.

30. 6. Legislative Limits on Science
and Technology
Landmarks- (tech. development)
Termination of the commercial
supersonic transport (SST) aircraft in
America.
• $839 million already spent (the Congress
voted not to provide any more money)
- (Science development) post-World
War II controversial prohibitions: “Delaney
Clause” forbids the inclusion in food, drugs, or
cosmetics, of any additives shown to be
carcinogenic in humans or laboratory animals
(zero-risk standard)

31. Current Situation- abandonment of some
projects seem advisable to the very legislative
bodies that authorized their initiation
ex. American SST project
- post-World War II era of life sciences
emerged but legislative bodies have been asked
to seriously consider various kinds of bans or
forced discontinuations of research.

32. Noteworthy Recent Cases and
Developments- bans in the last decade are
reproductive biology, embryology, and genetics.
*researches at issue is not prohibited per se,
but rather banned unless it meets certain
conditions. Thus:
• Commercial surrogate motherhood BANNED
• Surrogate motherhood per se ALLOWED
• Embryos beyond 14 days after fertilization BANNED
• “spare” embryos from in vitro fertilization ALLOWED

34. Outstanding Issues and Problems
• pressure on the right to freedom of scientific
inquiry.
• Funding needs of Big Science and Technology
projects
• Delaney clause
• “Mature discrimination or filtering out unwanted
costs?”
• No consensus exists about the proper role of
democratic legislature in advancing or moderating
the pace of developments in controversial new
fields of science and technology

35. CONCLUSION Survey indicates that the
SCOST mechanism
evolved by modern
industrial societies,
particularly in U.S., is a
complex, hydra-headed
construct.
Taken together, these modes
of SCOST may be seen as
potential parts of a kind of
comprehensive trial process
that all contemporary
scientific and technological
endeavors must undergo.
Such an endeavor is
subject to intervention
by potent social forces
attempting to shape its
nature, channel its
course, or modify its
conditions and likely
consequences.