Sustainable Development for the Americas

Science, Health, and Engineering Policy and Diplomacy

E. William Colglazier, Hassan A. Vafai, Kevin E. Lansey, Molli D. Bryson, E. William Colglazier, Hassan A. Vafai, Kevin E. Lansey, Molli D. Bryson

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000468038
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Derecho
• Subtopic: Derecho medioambiental

Environmental sustainability efforts require a great deal of engagement and political will, ranging from local communities to state departments. Science diplomats—from experts and scientists to spokespersons and ambassadors—can help facilitate at all levels and yield valued resources from technology sharing, capacity building, and knowledge exchanges. This book explores the importance of sustained international scientific cooperation, building community resilience, and the role of political will in sustainability and diplomacy. It shows how even small diplomatic efforts can influence myriad issues, from overfishing to human rights negotiations to global carbon emission reduction.

Features:

• Examines various topics such as global climate change, arid environments, water security and governance, trans-boundary conflict and cooperation, urban and rural resilience, and public health.

• Presents case studies from various geographic regions through the lens of diplomacy, including the US–Mexico border, the Gulf of California, South America, Europe, the Middle East, Central and South Asia, and China.

• Discusses how building networks of people, organizations, and countries engaged in science diplomacy is crucial for mutual growth and for overcoming conflicting political stances.

Sustainable Development for the Americas: Science, Health and Engineering Policy and Diplomacy provides a useful resource for diplomats, policymakers, students, and decision-makers. It provides numerous examples of how using science and technology for policy and diplomacy is essential to finding common ground among nations for a collective global benefit.

1Overcoming Social, Economic, and Environmental Challenges for the Americas and the WorldHow Can Science, Technology, and Innovation Help Find Solutions

DOI: 10.1201/9781003220503-1

1. Science Diplomacy at The University of ArizonaLiesl Folks
2. Introduction to Conference Chair
3. Panel Discussion
4. Science, Engineering, and Health Diplomacy: Why it matters for America and the WorldE. William Colglazier
5. Introduction to Panel Members
6. Introduction to Cherry Murray
7. Introduction to Ronit Prawer
8. Introduction to Vaughan Turekian
9. What Is Science Diplomacy?Cherry Murray
10. Science Policy
11. Science for Policy
12. Diplomacy for Science
13. Science for Diplomacy
14. How Does Science Diplomacy Advance Diplomacy among Nations?Ronit Prawer
15. British Science Diplomacy
16. Science Diplomacy in the Middle East
17. How Can Science Diplomacy Affect Change?Vaughan Turekian
18. The United States and Cuba
19. Questions and AnswersWilliam Colglazier
20. References

Summary

This chapter is a transcription of the opening plenary session for the conference. Honorary Chairman of the conference, Dr. E. William Colglazier, moderates a panel that includes Cherry A. Murray, Deputy Director of Research of the Biosphere 2 Institute; Ronit Prawer, Eastern U.S. Region Director for the U.K. Science and Innovation Network; and Vaughan C. Turekian, Executive Director of Policy and Global Affairs at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. They provide their perspectives and experience in science diplomacy how it can advance diplomatic relations as well as scientific advancement. This is followed by a Question and Answer period with the audience.

Science Diplomacy at The University of Arizona

Liesl Folks

Senior Vice President and Provost, The University of Arizona

Welcome everybody! It’s a great delight to see so many faces here for this important event. I would like to thank Kevin Lansey for inviting me to participate. I am very new to campus, still finding my way around, and still really discovering all the amazing things that go on around this wonderful research-intensive university.

It is a great pleasure to be here, particularly because if there is one thing of high importance to us right now, it is the role of policy in society. I want to particularly say a special thanks to the following people: Bill Colglazier, who is the honorary chair and organizing this evening’s panel session, the keynote speakers and plenary session panelists, all the sponsors, and members of the organizing committee. It is a heavy burden organizing any kind of conference, so thank you for bringing this marvelous group together.

Given the theme of this session, which is Overcoming Social, Economic, and Environmental Challenges for the Americas and the World: How Can Science, Technology, and Innovation Help Find Solutions, I would like to take just a moment to highlight the important role that The University of Arizona has played in collaborations across the state of Arizona, of course, but also across the nation and the world. In fact, there is nothing we do anymore in science that doesn’t ask of us to collaborate broadly. We have worked with European countries on particle physics to attempt to describe the origins of the universe. Speaking of the universe, we have partnered with corporations, universities, and NASA on the OSIRIS-REX mission to Mars, with the goal of helping us to better understand our origins and our destiny. We have engaged internationally with Latin American universities to research border issues such as water, immigration, and related topics.

The University of Arizona has demonstrated a record of expertise and an outstanding reputation in science, health, and engineering policy and diplomacy. We connect scientists with policy folks in areas such as climate science and climate change through the Udall Center, and more broadly through the Institute for Energy Solutions. The University’s environment is conducive to these interdisciplinary collaborations. We work, for example, with the Navajo people in addressing food, energy, and water insecurity with faculty from different departments coming together to accomplish research goals and to extend that research into practice in our communities regionally and nationally. Importantly, we find that our work with our Native peoples here has relevance to work with Native peoples around the world. There are partnerships building even since I’ve arrived with people in my home country in Australia, which is an amazing connection when you think about it.

Introduction to Conference Chair

To discuss how we can expand the impact of science further, I would like to introduce the honorary conference chair, E. William Colglazier who will moderate the panel discussion this evening.

In 2016 William Colglazier was appointed to the group selected to promote the role of science, technology, and innovation in achieving the United Nations’ “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” (United Nations General Assembly 2015). He was Science and Technology Advisor to the U.S. Secretary of State from 2011 to 2014, an executive officer of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council. He is editor-in-chief of Science and Diplomacy and a senior scholar in the Center for Science Diplomacy at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. While at Harvard’s Center for Science and International Affairs, he was the associate director of the Aspen Institute Program in Science, Technology, and Humanism. With that, I would like to ask Bill to come up to the stage and introduce his panelists so that we can kick off the discussion.

Thank you very much for being here, everybody.

Figures 1.1Opening session of the SPD conference, The University of Arizona, October 23, 2019.

Panel Discussion

Honorary Chair

E. William Colglazier

Senior Scholar and Editor-in-Chief of Science & Diplomacy, AAAS Center for Science Diplomacy

Panelists

Cherry A. Murray

Deputy Director of Research, Biosphere 2 Institute; Professor of Physics, The University of Arizona

Ronit Prawer

Eastern U.S. Region Director, U.K. Science and Innovation Network

Vaughan C. Turekian

Executive Director of Policy and Global Affairs, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine

Science, Engineering, and Health Diplomacy: Why It Matters for America and the World

E. William Colglazier

Honorary Chairman of the Conference

Figure 1.2Honorary Conference Chair, E. William Colglazier, at the opening session of the SPD conference, The University of Arizona, October 23, 2019.

It is a great pleasure to be back at The University of Arizona. The conference that was held two years ago, Science Diplomacy for the Americas, was great. I am very glad the university is continuing with this series, and hope similar conferences continue to be held at least every two years. The title this year, which was the logo on the nice button in our bags, is Sustainable Development for the Americas: Science, Health and Engineering Policy and Diplomacy. Arizona is obviously a unique place being right next to the border, interacting not only with Mexico and Central America, but with all of Latin America as well as Canada.

To “kick off” the conference, we have three distinguished practitioners of science diplomacy, for our session this evening, titled Science, Engineering, and Health Diplomacy: Why It Matters for America and the World. I am asking each of the speakers to tell us about what they think about science diplomacy as a very broad concept and how people interpret it in different ways, and also why it matters to them and why they think it is important. I would like for them to speak about their experiences using scientific knowledge, expertise, and international collaboration to advance diplomacy among nations, and also to tell us about some of the things that they believe science diplomacy has accomplished in their own careers. What they have been involved in, what some of the challenges have been, what some of the obstacles are, and what lessons they have learned that we can use as we think about how science and technology, and really all academic fields and all areas of human knowledge, can be useful, not only for diplomacy but also for helping countries to accomplish their broad goals. After they make their remarks, I will come back with two questions, but will leave plenty of time to open the conversation up to all of you in the audience.

When I think about science diplomacy, the part that fascinates and interests me the most is when science and technology can actually lead the way in terms of reaching diplomatic objectives. Sometimes people in the military talk about the “tip of the spear” being the leading edge, the people that are out in front. There are some cases where I think engaging in science and technology internationally has done that and has had benefits for diplomacy and for international relations. I think that has occurred in several areas that I have observed during my own career, certainly during the height of the Cold War in the 1980s, the fact that American scientists and Soviet scientists conducted what were called Track II discussions, not formal government discussions, about arms control and nuclear weapons. Those discussions actually had a tremendous influence when there was a window of opportunity in terms of international relations between the U.S. and Soviet Union, and contributed to many of the arms control agreements in the 1980s and 1990s (Bureau of Arms Control 1987).

Currently the area where we all are concerned is the issue of climate change. One of the important partnerships where science diplomacy also was the leading edge was the creation of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 1988, which brought together the world scientists that are focused on these problems, but also engaged with the policymakers and the decision-makers at the global level (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change n.d.). Their work and their partnership with the decision-makers helped lead the way to raising this issue up to the point where it actually could lead to progress on the diplomatic front at the global level.

In the case of dealing with different nations, one of the upcoming speakers at this conference is Dr. Glenn Schweitzer, a friend and colleague who has been heavily influential in the scientific engagement that was encouraged by both the U.S. Government and the Iranian Government, which has gone on for more than 15 years (Schweitzer and Neureiter 2008). It was also very useful for diplomacy. Although this scientific dialogue never dealt with the hard, nuclear issues, it dealt with all other areas of science with collaborations, meetings, and workshops between the scientists in the two countries. That helped create the goodwill that led to some of the diplomatic achievements.

But I think as all of us know, politics is a more powerful force than science. And of course, in some of these areas I mentioned, there have been setbacks, and certainly in arms control agreements with the U.S. and Russia backing away; in environmental agreements with the U.S. withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accord (Hersher 2019); in bilateral agreements with the problems right now after the U.S. withdrew from the 2015 Iranian nuclear agreement, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA (BBC Press 2018). So it shows you that none of these diplomatic challenges are easy; sometimes you have to take the long view. I still remain an optimist that science and technology can make a difference, and we have to keep using it to be the tip of the spear for trying to advance diplomacy, conversation, and dialogue between nations to tackle some of the really tough issues that our societies deal with.

Introduction to Panel Members

So I am going to turn it over to my three colleagues. Again, they will talk about their own view of what science diplomacy is, why it matters to them, to international engagement, and what are some of the lessons that they have learned in their careers putting science diplomacy into practice.

Figure 1.3Panelists at the opening session of the SPD conference, The University of Arizona, October 23, 2019.

Introduction to Cherry Murray

Our first speaker is Professor Cherry Murray. I have known Cherry for a long time. She is truly a distinguished scientist, member of the National Academy of Sciences. Recently, she was the Dean of Applied Science at Harvard and is now professor here at The University of Arizona. She is also Deputy Director of Research at Biosphere 2, which I had the distinct pleasure of touring this afternoon. It is truly a unique facility, doing really very interesting and cutting-edge science in specialized areas. She is also the co-chair of the InterAcademy Partnership (IAP) of the world’s science academies, and so she may tell you a little bit about that. She also had experience at the highest levels of U.S. national labs, including Bell Labs. So, she has had a very long and distinguished career. I think The University of Arizona is lucky to be able to attract her back here.

Introduction to Ronit Prawer

Our second speaker is Dr. Ronit Prawer. She is the Eastern U.S. Region director of a terrific U.K. program that ...