Of Science and Diplomacy - Prabhat Deshmukh

The India International Science Festival 2020 was held in December 2020 by India's Ministry of Science and Technology. As part of that event, there was an essay writing competition open for Students, Academia and Industry participants. My son, Prabhat Deshmukh took up the topic of "Necessity for Science Diplomacy" and made a submission. Happy to note that his write-up was awarded a prize amongst 100s of entries received. Below is what he wrote.

During the early decades of the Cold war – a shadow conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, in the uninhabited Antarctica could have become a potential site for nuclear weapons testing, and also could be a possible military base for either the US or Soviet Russia. Since Antarctica was uninhabited and far away from the main land countries nobody would be affected nor would they care about what was transcending in Antarctica, and thus, there was no other better place for conducting military tests.

If either of these countries succeeded in doing so, they would gain a military foothold over the other, and this would have only elevated tensions and caused devastation in the form of proxy wars between the US and Russia. However, Antarctica was a place that was rich in scientific potential, and many other countries also took note of this, which culminated into 12 countries signing a treaty called the Antarctica Trading Treaty, whose main aim was to use Antarctica for the mutual benefit and advancement of the involved countries. America and Russia were one of the 12 countries, and since the Treaty stated that there would be no military incidents nor would there be encroachment and claiming of territories, and the potential devastation that could have been caused was now neutralized. In addition, US and Russian scientists saw them working with each other, even though their respective government were in a clandestine war.

This is a wonderful example of international cooperation because of science, or rather, for fulfilling scientific goals regardless of the semantical reasons, situations, past or current ongoing tensions and conflicts. We can get a fair idea about what “Science Diplomacy” is through this example, but let us define it nevertheless – Science Diplomacy is the procedure of creating possible long-lasting international relationships through science.

Why Science Diplomacy?

Due to the political and military supremacy of many countries, there have been many instances of war in the recent years as well, which have nevertheless caused widespread devastation and loss. Many countries are developing nuclear weapons and are upgrading their arsenals, and it seems like the governments of the world are preparing for war, and who knows of the many tensions that could be ongoing internationally. This is another great reason why science diplomacy works, because science is a neutral pretext for opening up negotiations and for cooperation to happen. It is not partial, but factual, meaning, it does not favour any particular societal classes, sects, races, or religions, which is why science diplomacy works.

Science and Diplomacy complement each other, because science requires access to different places, people, resources and funding, all of which diplomacy can help obtain. Further, science helps in informing diplomacy - meaning, through science governments can design policies and make decisions which help in bettering the application of diplomacy.

Examples to better illustrate the claim; In 1987, an unexpected yet necessary collaboration between scientists and diplomats all over the world led to the implementation of the Montreal Protocol, which basically stated that the usage of chemicals and other substances emitted by cars, refrigerators, air conditioners and jet planes that caused ozone layer depletion, must be completely halted. This ground-breaking decision had a positive effect, and when checked in 2018, the ozone layer was on track of recovery, making this one of the most successful international collaborations because of science.

Cooperation through science can also help in the advancement of research and experimentation, along with the collateral effect of building international relationships. In the early 2000s Japan, USA, and Western Europe accounted for 90% of patenting and 70% of scientific publishing. But later decades would see the rise of scientific collaboration which resulted in many other countries coming to the forefront of scientific discoveries and inventions as in China, India, Israel, Singapore and the Republic of Korea also accounted for scientific publishing and patenting, thus decreasing the figureheads in Japan, USA, and Europe.

Has it been practiced previously?

Let us now see why science diplomacy is fundamental, and how it was un-intendedly practiced historically as well; The Royal Society of London is one of the oldest science communities in the world, which is headed by a foreign secretary. One of the primary roles of the foreign secretary is to maintain contact with scientists and other science communities overseas to learn of scientific developments. Moreover, the role of foreign secretary was created even before governments appointed official diplomats, and though the foreign secretaries over the years have not contributed to some great developments or noteworthy international relationships, this just goes to prove that it could all well have been a possibility.

When 20th century scientists look back on their careers with perfect retrospection, they would point out many instances when they themselves acted as unofficial diplomats, and also worked with officials of different countries for the purpose of scientific research.

How science diplomacy?

There have been many instances in the past where science diplomacy has been successfully implemented, but my objective in this section is not to discuss the various examples and instances, but to illustrate how diplomacy through science can occur using a common formula.

Let us take the pretext of a global virus pandemic, and since we can all relate to the unfortunate conditions, this example will be more expressive. Scientists from all over the world can first individually research and experiment to produce evidences and a possible cure for the virus. These findings must be then submitted to the respective government officials, who must take the necessary steps regarding trade and transport, economy and society, resource utilization and allocation, amidst answering many crucial questions.

When these events are happening internally, diplomats can keep lines of communication open, which will aid the exchange of information between countries, and can also help in the betterment of downtrodden countries by the sharing of resources – food, medicines, and funding. (This is wholly hypothetical and is said assuming many ideal factors that may not be fully applicable in the real world).

A similar type of collaboration has been done in the past for the vaccination and containment of outbreaks like SARS, H1N1, MERS and Ebola through multilateral action.

Disadvantage

Since science diplomacy has not been officially defined and nor has it been formally applied, its extent of validity and limitations are unknown, but since everything carries both good and bad, there is a disadvantage when science diplomacy is practiced.

Since scientists from one country gain access to the resources and lands of other countries, in some cases it could result in the exploitation of the so obtained resources, and would leave little for the natives of that country. In other words, science colonialism could occur due to science diplomacy.

In Conclusion

Given the way the world has been rapidly changing in the face of several landmark events in the past years – Wars, Natural Calamities, Pandemic to name a few, it seems prudent that the Scientific community break the barriers of borders, expand their perspective of the world and share knowhow to bring about a better world – for the world needs a lot of Science Diplomats to beat Hunger, Climate Change, Pandemics. Something noteworthy that the late Egyptian Scientist Ahmed Zewail says:

The soft power of science has the potential to reshape global diplomacy