National critical technologies report.

  • United States. Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Date:
1995
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: National critical technologies report. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    This definition explicitly answers the question “Critical for what?” thereby helping to link policy objectives to choices of technologies. For example, since improvements in education at all levels are considered essential to the future economic prosperity and national security of the United States, education and training software which enables advanced education and training methods and systems is a critical technology that meets the definition above. CLASSIFICATION AND AGGREGATION METHODOLOGY The National Critical Technologies Report defines “criticality” in the broadest possible way—to “develop and further the long-term national security or economic prosperity of the United States.” Thus, this list must be integrative ina fundamental sense, incorporating the diverse concerns and objectives which comprise ideas of security and prosperity and which drive much of the other list- making activity. It must also identify areas not captured in extant lists because they span the concerns or responsibilities of several different agencies or groups. The 1995 National Critical Technologies list was created through a process of input from multiple constituencies in a traceable and reproducible manner, described in greater detail in Appendix B. The process began with a candidate list which included technologies appearing in the first Report of the National Critical Technologies Panel (March 1991), as well as the lists published by the Department of Commerce, Department of Defense, Department of Energy and by NASA. A four-level hierarchical structure was used to integrate lists based on different organizational schemes and levels of aggregation. Sample or illustrative applications to which the technologies contributed were also included, although the list of applications was not expected to be exhaustive. Technology experts were utilized to include knowledge of specific technologies and applications where existing lists did not contain a sufficient level of detail. In addition, the candidate list indicated whether each specific technology contributed primarily to economic prosperity, national security, or both. The six major technology categories in the 1991 list? were changed to seven. The descriptions of the seven categories are shown in Table A.1. The candidate list classified technologies according to the nature of the skills and problems involved in their development, not by the technologies’ applications. This focus on underlying technologies rather than applications streamlined the list. Many technologies support multiple applications, so an application-based taxonomy | complicates a technology list by forcing the same technology to be placed in multiple categories. Technology focus was also deemed to be more helpful to users because it allowed them to see the breadth of influence of a technology and to determine whether a technology meets their requirements for criticality based on applications it supports. 3The 1993 Panel did not re-write or alter the 1991 list.