Hybrid conference: The Sputnik Factor. Scientific and Technological Global Competition, Collaboration and Circulation of Knowledge in the post-Sputnik years

Hybrid conference: The Sputnik Factor. Scientific and Technological  Global Competition, Collaboration and Circulation of Knowledge in the post-Sputnik years. May 18-20, Barcelona and zoom 

On 4 October 1957 the Soviets launched the first unmanned satellite, the Sputnik I. As Walter A. McDougall has argued, the Sputnik I was a turning point in the history of the USA. A reluctant Eisenhower first and an enthusiast Kennedy later promoted a stronger integration between basic scientific research and military oriented research. Basic research was lavishly funded and oriented by the central government. At the same time collaboration with the Soviets was resumed and one year later the Lacy-Zarubin agreement was signed. Both emotional and rational factors played a part. In early 1960s most US economists were persuaded that given the current rate of growth of the two countries sooner or later Soviet economy would overcome that of the USA. In 1961, Paul Samuelson even foresaw that given the current growth pace of the two countries in a period between 23 and 36 years Soviet economy would overtake that of the USA . In 1963, in his famous ‘white heat speech’ Harold Wilson declared that Britain had to copy the Soviet kind of integration between science and industry. Even if the West maintained a global scientific and technological superiority over USSR, the Soviets were competitive on certain crucial sectors, such as tank production and space technology.  The perspective that Soviet science and technology could compete with that of the West had also a global impact in the competition between the two super-powers in Africa and Asia.

 This workshop aims to explore the impact of the “Sputnik shock” in Eastern Europe, in the West, in the confrontation between the two blocs in the developing countries and in the making of the International and Inter-European scientific organization and collaborative project. Indeed, between 1954 and 1964, the CERN, EURATOM, the European Space Research Organization (ESRO), the European Space Research Vehicle Launcher Development (ELDO) and the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) were founded. A number of other intra-European scientific networks were envisaged, but did not see the light, such as a NATO project for a European MIT.

In same cases this impact was direct, in other cases it was rather indirect. During the Cold War any cultural, political and economic activity in the Western Bloc was in a way conditioned by what happened in the Eastern Bloc, and vice versa: what the Soviets were doing or what it was believed they were doing influenced the decisions taken in the West and vice versa, even if there was no direct causal connection. Michael Gordin's book on the Velikovsky affair is an example of how the Cold War context, the fear that the Soviets could take the lead in scientific research, shaped the debate around Velikovsky, even if the Soviets played no active role at all in the quarrel.

the workshop can be attended either face-to-face at Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona

25/27 Ramon Trias Fargas

Mercè Rodoreda building, room 23S05

or via zoom. Those interested in receiving a zoom link may write to daniele.cozzoli@upf.edu<mailto:daniele.cozzoli@upf.edu>

Programme

Thursday 18th of May

 14:30 Welcome and introduction

 15:00 – 15:45 John Krige (Georgiatech and Science Po, Paris)

 “US global collaboration/competition in the scientific and technological Cold War."

 15:45 – 16:30 Angela Romano (University of Bologna) “European or Transatlantic? Competition or cooperation? WEU Assembly’s debates on how to respond to USSR space achievements.”

 16:30 – 16:45 coffee break

 16: 45 – 17: 30 Matteo Gerlini (University of Siena)

 “The European Commission Joint research centre and the quest for its nuclear reactor type between USA and USSR.”

 17: 30 – 18:15 Simone Turchetti (University of Manchester)

“Globalizing Cold War competition through scientific collaboration: the case of SEATO’s science initiatives, 1957-1977”

 18:15 – 19:00 Giulia Bentivoglio (University of Padua) (on line)

 “In search of modernity. The United Kingdom and Italy between technological gap and European integration”

Friday 19th of May

9:00 – 09:45

Roberto Lalli (Polytechnic of Turin)

“The CERN as a model? The establishments of pan-European schemes of cooperation in physics in post-Sputnik Era”

 09:45 – 10:30

Pedro Ruíz (University of Valencia) and Pablo Soler Ferran (Independent scholar, Madrid)

“The Spanish nuclear industry and the trade relationships to ensure the supply of

enriched uranium

10:30 – 11:15

Giuliana Gemelli (University of Bologna) (on line)

“James Killian and the MIT Revolution in the Sixties”

 11:15 – 11:30 coffee break

 11:30 – 12:15

Daniele Cozzoli, (Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona)

“The National Academy of Science and the Collaboration with USSR from the Lacy-Zarubin Agreement to the détente (1957 - 1979)”

12:15 – 13:00 Slava Gerovitch (Massachussets Institute of Technology)

“We live in a prison”: Informal international contacts of Soviet mathematicians.”

 13: 00 – 14:30 lunch

 14: 30 – 15:15

 Alexei Kojevnikov (University of British Columbia)

“A Little Sputnik That Could”: Poetic Technologies and Historical Future”

 15:15 – 16:00

Doubravka Olsakova (Czech Academy of Science)

Language and Future Shock: Army Dictionaries, Linguistics, and New Technologies in Eastern Europe

16:00 – 16:45 Jan Surman (Czech Academy of Science) and Lukas Becht (University of Vienna)

“Futures after Sputnik: Future Studies in Central Europe and multiple emancipations”

 16:45 – 17:00 coffee break

 17:00- 17:45 Olga Dubrovina (University of Padua)

“Moscow Space Future Forum of 1987: the Soviet space program 30 years after the launch of the first Sputnik.”

17:45 – 18:30 Tatiana Kasperski (Centre for Baltic and East European Studies, Södertörn University, Stockholm) tatiana.kasperski@sh.se<mailto:tatiana.kasperski@sh.se>

“Radioactive Waste Under Capitalism and Socialism: Environmental Consequences of the East-West Technological Competition in the First Decades of the Atomic Age”

Saturday 20th of May

09:00 - 09:45 Laurence Roche Nye (Sorbonne University)

“A capacity to cooperate. The French-Soviet long duration agreement in space sciences and technology. (1966-1992)”

09:45 – 10:30 Paul Josephson (Colby College)

"Circulating Waters:  Cold War Projects in Hydropower, East and West"

 10:30 – 11:15 Mary Augusta Brazelton (University of Cambridge)

“Biomedical research and development in China during the transition to Maoism”

11:15: 11:30 coffee break

11:30 – 12:15 Steffi Marung (Leipzig University)

“After sputnik and after empire: The reconfiguration of international African Studies since the early 1960s”

12:30 – 13:15 Justina Aniceta Turkowska (University of Edinburgh)

“The (re)birth of scientific detail in the age of planetary knowledge: Geoscientific expertise and education in 1960s West Africa in the context of the Cold War.”