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Science 30 May 1986:
Vol. 232. no. 4754, pp. 1099 - 1105
DOI: 10.1126/science.232.4754.1099
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Articles

The Space Shuttle Program: A Policy Failure?

JOHN M. LOGSDON 1

1 Director of the Graduate Program in Science, Technology, and Public Policy, George Washington University, Washington, DC 20052.

The 5 January 1972 announcement by President Richard Nixon that the United States would develop during the 1970's a new space transportation system—the space shuttle—has had fundamental impacts on the character of U.S. space activities. In retrospect, it can be argued that the shuttle design chosen was destined to fail to meet many of the policy objectives established for the system; the shuttle's problems in serving as the primary launch vehicle for the United States and in providing routine and cost-effective space transportation are in large part a result of the ways in which compromises were made in the 1971-72 period in order to gain White House and congressional approval to proceed with the program. The decision to develop a space shuttle is an example of a poor quality national commitment to a major technological undertaking.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Democracy and Super Technologies: The Politics of the Space Shuttle and Space Station Freedom.
W.D. Kay (1994)
Science Technology Human Values 19, 131-151
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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)