IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB001211967

National Science Foundation Patronage of Social Science, 1970s and 1980s: Congressional Scrutiny, Advocacy Network, and the Prestige of Economics (2012)

Mata, Tiago (Author)
Scheiding, Tom (Author)

Minerva: A Review of Science, Learning and Policy
Volume: 50, no. 4
Issue: 4
Pages: 423-449
Publication date: 2012
Language: English

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Patronage Government sponsored science Social sciences Science and government Economics 20th century, late National Science Foundation (U.S.)

Research in the social sciences received generous patronage in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Research was widely perceived as providing solutions to emerging social problems. That generosity came under increased contest in the late 1970s. Although these trends held true for all of the social sciences, this essay explores the various ways by which economists in particular reacted to and resisted the patronage cuts that were proposed in the first budgets of the Reagan administration. Economists' response was three fold: to engage in joint lobbying with other social scientists, to tap into their authority as a respected policy player, and to influence the types of research financed by the patron. With interviews of the former lobbyist for the social scientists, the former director of the Economics program for the National Science Foundation, and a review of the archival records of economists and their scholarly society, we discuss how economists have claimed entitlement to patronage in the closing decades of the twentieth century. We observe a dynamic and productive relationship between politicians and researchers mediated by the National Science Foundation, where civil servants, lobbyist and public minded scientists, and self-serving grantees trade roles.

...More

Citation URI

data.isiscb.org/p/isis/citation/CBB001211967

This citation is part of the Isis database.

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Article Crowther-Heyck, Hunter; (2006)
Patrons of the Revolution: Ideals and Institutions in Postwar Behavioral Science (/p/isis/citation/CBB000671526/)

Book Solovey, Mark; (2013)
Shaky Foundations: The Politics--Patronage--Social Science Nexus in Cold War America (/p/isis/citation/CBB001550276/)

Book Mark Solovey; (2020)
Social Science for What?: Battles over Public Funding for the "Other Sciences" at the National Science Foundation (/p/isis/citation/CBB950238763/)

Book Solovey, Mark; (2013)
Shaky Foundations: The Politics-Patronage-Social Science Nexus in Cold War America (/p/isis/citation/CBB001420023/)

Article Kuteinikov, A. V.; Shilov, V. V.; (2011)
Automated Management Systems for the Soviet Union: A 1959 Letter from A. I. Kitov to N. S. Khrushchev (/p/isis/citation/CBB001211394/)

Article Eisler, Matthew N.; (2013)
“The Ennobling Unity of Science and Technology”: Materials Sciences and Engineering, the Department of Energy, and the Nanotechnology Enigma (/p/isis/citation/CBB001420869/)

Article Solovey, Mark; (2012)
Senator Fred Harris's National Social Science Foundation Proposal: Reconsidering Federal Science Policy, Natural Science--Social Science Relations, and American Liberalism during the 1960s (/p/isis/citation/CBB001231876/)

Book Mann, Alfred K.; (2000)
For Better or for Worse: The Marriage of Science and Government in the United States (/p/isis/citation/CBB000100263/)

Article Gallo, Jason; (2009)
The Discursive and Operational Foundations of the National Nanotechnology Initiative in the History of the National Science Foundation (/p/isis/citation/CBB000932271/)

Thesis Gallo, Jason; (2008)
Speaking of Science: The Role of the National Science Foundation in the Development of United States Information Infrastructure (/p/isis/citation/CBB001561196/)

Article Zhu, Jianhong; (2003)
Analysis on the Background to the Establishment of the National Science Foundation of the U. S. A. (/p/isis/citation/CBB000500424/)

Chapter Porter, Theodore M.; (2007)
Precision (/p/isis/citation/CBB001022566/)

Article Solovey, Mark; (2004)
Riding Natural Scientists' Coattails onto the Endless Frontier: The SSRC and the Quest for Scientific Legitimacy (/p/isis/citation/CBB000671316/)

Book Orth, Karin; Oberkrome, Willi; (2010)
Die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft 1920--1970: Forschungsförderung im Spannungsfeld von Wissenschaft und Politik (/p/isis/citation/CBB001023723/)

Book Rohde, Joy; (2013)
Armed with Expertise: The Militarization of American Social Research during the Cold War (/p/isis/citation/CBB001420027/)

Article Stamhuis, Ida H.; (2007)
A Nineteenth-Century Statistical Society that Abandoned Statistics (/p/isis/citation/CBB000773207/)

Article Dzuback, Mary Ann; (2009)
Women Scholars, Social Science Expertise, and the State in the United States (/p/isis/citation/CBB001030823/)

Article Heukelom, Floris; (2012)
A Sense of Mission: The Alfred P. Sloan and Russell Sage Foundations' Behavioral Economics Program, 1984--1992 (/p/isis/citation/CBB001251562/)

Article Kurihara, Takeshi; (2003)
Non Military Character of the National Science Foundation and the Movement of the Federation of American Scientists: Debate on the Support System of Scientific Research and Development Activities in the United States, 1945--1950 (/p/isis/citation/CBB000600619/)

Article Heyck, Hunter; (2014)
The Organizational Revolution and the Human Sciences (/p/isis/citation/CBB001321203/)