In response to recurrent concerns that the US State Department is unable or unwilling to integrate science into US foreign policy, the National Academy of Sciences has been invited to conduct a fresh review of the status of science in the department (see page 427). No doubt the academy will find sizeable flaws in its handling of scientific issues, reflecting the view of science policy experts — expressed in testimony before the House of Representatives Science Committee last week as on previous occasions — that the State Department neglects science. Reforming this situation in an institution that is so large and entrenched is clearly more easily said than done.

Before spending much energy on the attempt, the community should ask itself to what extent the State Department's alleged neglect really matters to research. In one or two respects it does. Neglect of science and technology at the diplomatic level makes it harder to forge international agreement on scientific collaboration. This weakness has inflicted some damage on various large scientific projects, such as the abandoned Superconducting Super Collider. For the wider global scientific enterprise, the State Department and its equivalents in other countries matter less and less. In science as in commerce, except where intergovernmental agreements are concerned, the process of globalization will increasingly allow international communication to bypass official channels altogether.

But, no less than in the Cold War era, science and technology collaboration can help to build or reinforce good relations between countries. In short, the State Department needs science rather more than science needs the State Department.