Washington

Similar approach: Bush (right) and Gore both promise to boost science funding if elected. Credit: RICHARD DREW/AP

Both of the main candidates in this year's tightly contested US presidential election are promising to boost research funding — especially at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) — and maintain the existing structure of research agencies, according to statements from their campaign staff.

The similar approaches to science and technology policy taken by vice-president Al Gore, the Democrat nominee, and George W. Bush, the Republican, contrast with some previous campaigns. In 1992, for example, Democrat challenger Bill Clinton pledged to revive US industry with billions of dollars worth of new technology programmes.

This time, the Bush campaign is pledging an extra $20 billion over five years for military research and development. But it is not clear how much of this would be spent on science, or even on applied science: four-fifths of current military R&D spending goes on weapons development and testing.

The similar approaches were clear at a debate last week between representatives of the Gore and Bush camps, organized by the Washington Science Policy Alliance.

But the debate did reveal sharp differences on areas of policy influenced by scientific knowledge, such as global warming and ballistic missile defence. Bush promises to deploy national missile defence, whereas Gore says he will consider its effectiveness and the views of US allies before deployment. Gore will seek Senate ratification for the Kyoto Protocol on climate change; Bush wants to renegotiate it.

In addition, Bush promises to fight to ensure that US farmers' genetically modified crops are allowed to enter the European Union. David Beier, Gore's chief domestic policy advisor and a former executive with biotechnology firm Genentech, says that “we need to be very careful” about dealing with agricultural biotechnology.

Both candidates are committed to doubling the NIH's budget from its 1998 level of $13.5 billion to $27 billion by 2003 or soon after. Both have also pledged more money for the National Science Foundation, with Gore saying that he hopes to double its budget in five years.

Former Republican congressman Bob Walker, speaking for the Bush campaign at the debate, said that cuts in military research under the Clinton administration “had crippled a lot of our universities”. But Beier argued that the vice-president's interest in science and technology was “probably greater than that of any presidential candidate in history”.

Neither candidate has drawn up detailed proposals for science and technology, although both campaigns summarized their plans in questionnaires published in Physics Today this month and Science this week.

Hopes that Bush would devote a speech to science and technology are receding, although Gore may do so shortly, possibly on a visit to Michigan.

Science lobbyists, disappointed at the lack of science and technology in the campaigns, note that the tightness of the race — and the candidates' need to focus relentlessly on hot-button issues such as healthcare for the elderly — has diverted them from speeches or policy papers on less mainstream topics.

Also, Gore is expected to win easily in science-rich states such as California, Massachusetts and Maryland. Of large states where the election could go either way, only Michigan has a major stake in research and development.

The candidates have “much greater differences on other stuff” than on research policy, says Al Teich, head of science and technology policy at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, who helped to organize the debate.

In the Science questionnaire, Gore says: “My favourite subject at school was science.” Apparently impressed, Nobel laureates Murray Gell-Mann and Harold Varmus are circulating a letter urging scientists and engineers to support the Gore campaign.