Paul Dufour, adjunct professor and fellow, University of Ottawa.

Boutique science diplomacy

By Paul Dufour

There you have it. Two speeches on science in Washington in the same week (see box on right) — one by the US President (his second to the National Academy of Sciences celebrating their 150 anniversary) and the other by Canada's junior minister for science and technology (his second to the AAAS forum on S&T policy). Both given in a period of austerity enveloped within a context of politicized attacks on science and the increased globalization of knowledge.

Readers of RE$EARCH MONEY who follow the Canada-US science and technology partnership will know it is an extensive one. It is also critical given the global reach and leadership of the US in science and research. So when a junior science minister heads to Washington to deliver a keynote address to a sophisticated audience, it helps if you have something new and relevant to offer. Otherwise, the US audience — given its oft-obsessive pre-occupation with global leadership — quickly moves on to the next suitor.

The May 2 speech by the Minister was essentially a checklist of programs and policies of the current Harper administration with a smattering of existing bilateral initiatives. To say it was nepheligenous would be an understatement, laced as it was with the usual doses of jactation.

To be fair, when the major baseline is an outmoded six-year-old federal science and technology strategy unhinged from other policies with a tired mantra, one should not be surprised at the yawn that follows. That same day in DC, interestingly, president Obama and Mexican president Pena Nieto announced the formation of a Bilateral Forum on Higher Education, Innovation, and Research to expand opportunities for citizens of both countries and to help develop a 21st century workforce.

There was a time not long ago, when governments would prepare a serious agenda going to Washington. Knowledge diplomacy mattered. For instance, when the Canadian minister for science spoke to the same AAAS S&T conference in April 1993, he outlined the need for a focused joint approach on science culture by engaging more youth in knowledge and discovery. He even offered that Canada would participate with the US in its National Science and Technology Week (to be reciprocated by the US in Canada's own S&T week).

When the US president and the Canadian prime minister met in DC in April 1997, they announced joint participation in the GLOBE program for environment science and education; outlined next generation internet links via CANARIE and the National Science Foundation; initiated a project on new production technologies to help industries become more competitive, sketched plans for a new Polar Cap observatory, and triggered a dialogue between their respective science advisory committees.

In May 1997, during a joint Canada-US innovation roundtable in DC, an exchange program between the two industry departments was launched along with projects centred on skills shortages and skills development; climate change technologies; e-commerce and SME technology extension. A brochure outlining the scale and scope of the Canada-US STI relationship was published when another Canadian industry minister visited the US in 1998.

In Obama's April 2013 speech to the NAS, he detailed an agenda that included a large-scale $100-million brain research initiative; more focus on maths and science education and outreach, and grand challenges in clean energy research and manufacturing to name a few.

Given their complementarities to the Harper government, it is surprising that these were not underscored as areas that Canada could collaboratively address in a renewed partnership with specific actions. One needs shiny new things to attract the attention of the US policy-making machinery.

As the next version of the federal S&T strategy is re-tooled with hopefully a more global focus, the Canadian minister responsible for research needs to re-consider an engaged and principled strategy in S&T and innovation with the US, Canada's largest science relation by far. There are key areas where Canada can benefit from a leveraged partnership not to mention learning about the conduct of effective public science advice and research integrity in government.

It is a reality, not mere rhetoric, that science and innovation operate in an open and global environment. Well-designed science diplomacy can be a key platform for new research and outcomes for mutual benefit.

Listing a menu of disconnected national initiatives to a savvy and connected audience in DC without grasping the larger opportunity in constructively moving the science and innovation agenda forward with a science superpower is not merely policy manqué, but a missed window for effective science diplomacy.

Paul Dufour is an adjunct professor and fellow, Institute for Science, Society and Policy, University of Ottawa.