A [European] Community environmental policy cannot be conceived except in close connection with all the Community’s problems such as the direction and limits of growth, consumer protection, working conditions in businesses, the future of cities and agriculture, etc…It is a set of complex interdisciplinary problems of which we often do not yet know all the impacts, interconnections, and consequences. It is to give the Community a capable intellectual instrument [instrument intellectuel capable] that we spoke in our communications…of an Interdisciplinary European Institute for Environmental Problems in a Global Perspective…our project could in future be conceived from a broader perspective as a European cultural center for the study of societal policy [politique de la société]. It should not replace but support and effectively integrate the institutes that already exist in our countries.
Spinelli, speech, Bonn, 31 October 1972 (AS-202 Discours prononcés par Altiero Spinelli en tant que commissaire CEE, vol. 1)
Altiero Spinelli (b. 1907-d. 1986), quoted above, was one of a handful of left-leaning politicians to lead the science & research portfolio in the European Commission (one other was Edith Cresson). His tenure at the Commission (1970-1976) coincided with a period when many ideas did the rounds in Brussels, but few (?) enacted as policies.
Spinelli is of course most famous for his support for a United States of Europe and in particular the European Parliament as the key actor of democratic federalism. A lawyer by training, he was imprisoned/held under house arrest for 16 years by Mussolini for opposing the Fascist regime (see: here for short biography). Spinelli associated with the Italian Communist Party, for example when he was elected to the European Parliament; but he said he was not a member and indeed worked with both Christian Democrat & socialist politicians (De Gasperi & Nenni, respectively).
Spinelli’s role in formulating science & research policies is perhaps incidental to many accounts of his life. One might wonder, therefore, why one would want to dredge up this forgotten story from the distant past. I am not really sure I have a good answer to that question, nor do I know much about Spinelli, the intellectual & political context of the early 1970s, or indeed the detailed history of European science & research policy.
It is just that when I read Spinelli’s speeches on science and research (freely available online in the Historical Archives of the European Union), they seem to me to contain intriguing notions. I guess he is a kind of European version of Vannevar Bush, but the comparison ought not to be taken far.
As the quote at the top is intended to show (it is just one example), & as far as I can gather, Spinelli wanted a European R&D institute or institutes that would develop solutions to societal problems, which he conceived in a systemic, interconnected, and multi-disciplinary way (‘a capable intellectual instrument’; in other contexts: ‘a multipurpose body’ [organe polyvalent], etc. – his terminology was not consistent but the notion seems similar).
Why I think this is still perhaps pertinent is the EU continues to lack such an instrument or body, although it has embryonic forms such as the Joint Research Centre (JRC) & EU-ANSA (EU executive agencies science network); perhaps even the European University Institute (EUI). In this note I have gathered information on Spinelli’s vision of European R&D & what it might mean for us today.
Spinelli’s vision in the early 1970s: what worked, what failed; & why
Expenditure for scientific development can no longer be regarded as something which develops in itself independently of other needs. There is a necessity to regroup the initiatives of researchers, of governments, that is to say it is more and more necessary to have planning of scientific research…it appears more and more that we must concentrate on a problem that is becoming ever more serious for all peoples, the problem of research into improving the quality of life, into the quality of our society, rather than into the quantity of needs to be satisfied.
Altiero Spinelli, 1971, Scientists in Search of Their Conscience: Proceedings of a Symposium on The Impact of Science on Society organised by The European Committee of the Weizmann Institute of Science Brussels (28-29 June 1971)
I have done very limited reading, mainly of Spinelli’s speeches in the early 1970s. My lack of knowledge is a vital caveat. But my impression (and that is all it is) is that at least by 1971 (and possibly earlier, of course), Spinelli was talking widely about the need for the European Communities to reorganize R&D activities around what he called quality of life issues (see above quote). Indeed, this was a reoccurring theme in his speeches over the next couple of years. It is important to remember at this time that the European Communities’ previous attempt at coordinated R&D, EURATOM (atomic energy), had collapsed; Spinelli was a critic of both the European project thus far inadequately realized to his mind, and EURATOM in particular.
By 1972, Spinelli had written a comprehensive plan that linked his aspirations for that ‘capable intellectual instrument’ which would undertake R&D directly relevant to a broad range of quality of life issues at a European level – with the bureaucratic realities of the European Commission. One of these realities was the JRC, which had been set-up to develop the now discredited EURATOM program, and was therefore threatened with closure. The other major factor around this time: the European Communities were expanding to admit UK, Ireland, & Denmark (1973). Spinelli (who employed a British adviser called Christopher Layton), expressed perhaps unwarranted enthusiasm about the possibilities for R&D due to UK entry.
Spinelli’s plan, which I believe is captured in COM(72) 700, was presented to the member states in June 1972. Overall, it sought ‘instruments for preparing and proposing the successive but coherent decisions which will build up the common policy for R&D and with the bodies and resources necessary for implementing them. Specifically he had in mind creating various new bureaucratic entities (selected examples below):
- Comité européen pour la Recherche et le Développement (CERD), comprised a full-time scientific advisor, 18 scientists and ‘users of science’ + a ‘think-tank’ of 10-15 ‘highly-qualified people’ across the natural & social sciences to undertake analysis. Task would be to advise the Commission on national R&D plans and otherwise coordinate European activities.
- A council of ministers responsible for R&D to take the major decisions; a Committee for Consultation and Coordination comprised Commission officials & representatives from the member states who set and implement R&D plans. This group would encourage an alignment of national policies.
- European Research and Development Agency (ERDA). Independent agency charged with tasks such as award of scientific and technical research contracts; management & supervision of programs (in conjunction with competent national authorities); transfer, exchange and application of research results.
- European Science Foundation (ESF) led by ‘a governing board…of key
figures from the major scientific institutions of the member states’. Tasks include organizing collaborative activities particularly in regard to fundamental research; identifying institutions with potential to become ‘European centers of excellence’; assessing the largest national investments in research equipment, e.g., radio telescopes, costing above 25m units of account (I think approx. US$25m at that time or US$155m today; see here, p. 6 & here); advising the Commission on R&D funding requirements. Large measure of autonomy with its own budget.
Outside of the above proposal, Spinelli had also regularly called for the formation of pan-European state enterprises such as a European Telecom Corporation; restructuring of companies at a continental scale, etc. (citing his address to ‘British businessmen’, 1972); and a ‘Rhine Basin Agency’ to clean up the Rhine. It seems by 1974 (oil crisis), & in the wake of a proposal by Henry Kissinger on coordinated energy research, he might also have had a European agency on the pattern of NASA in mind (not focused on space, but energy research); he suggested to the Commission President that ‘execution of the programs should be entrusted to an agency, comparable in a way to NASA, working in autonomy under the Commission’s control’ (citing: Communication to President of the European Commission, 8 Feb 1974).
In the historical accounts I have read, Spinelli’s notion of European-level science is seen as centralized, application-oriented, and planned, and undertaken within the context of a common industrial policy. This is contrasted to his contemporary & rival in the Commission, Dahrendorf, who emphasized basic or fundamental research, with the European Communities solely as a coordinator & facilitator of activities conceived and delivered by member states. Spinelli certainly sought supra-national solutions and was accordingly disappointed by the turn the European Community had taken, with decision-making powers focused largely in the member state governments.
The key pivot point is said to be when Spinelli’s plan was rejected by the member states, in favor of Dahrendorf’s more minimal plan. The Italian, Belgium, and Netherlands delegations backed Spinelli; while France, West Germany & the UK backed Dahrendorf. The bigger states won the day; representatives from the Netherlands, in particular, were angry, but powerless to effect change.
There are no obvious left/right political explanations for the split between the countries given quite a mixed picture on both sides of the fence. We could therefore say reasons for the split lay with respective European visions, to the extent that the smaller states realized an integrated approach would work better than national approaches. On the contrary, UK, France, and West Germany had not yet accepted they were small states & therefore remained committed, in general, to national science and technology policy. (citing: Haas, et al., 1977, Scientists and World Order: The Uses of Technical Knowledge in International Organizations, p. 172; André, 2006, L’espace européen de la recherche: histoire d’une idée, in: Journal of European Integration History).
If Spinelli’s plans were apparently checked in one major direction, his ‘radical housecleaning’ of ‘our’ Joint Research Centre was relatively more successful (quoted phrases taken from his London speech, 21 Sep 1972). His objective was to convert the JRC from an atomic energy research agency (associated with the failed EURATOM) to ‘a multipurpose body’ or ‘research service’ destined to respond to ‘the needs of society in numerous fields’ & improve ‘the quality of life’.
In his analysis, the new, reformed, version of the JRC was not a standalone activity, but would, he hoped, be ‘inserted into the common R&D policy’. He also said he wanted to ‘decentralize and make autonomous’ the JRC (citing: Déclaration de M. Spinelli au Conseil le 25 septembre 1972; speech to visiting British businessmen, 11 July 1972; Commission of the European Communities, 1972, Objectives and instruments of a common policy for scientific research and technological development, COM(72) 700, 14 June 1972).
There seem to have been a lot of practical management problems in regard to the JRC (citing: P. Caprioglio to President of the European Commission, 10 Feb 1972); it is not entirely clear if Spinelli was interested in the day-to-day aspects of his vision (besides which the JRC fell under Dahrendorf’s portfolio, ironically enough). What seems possible is that he saw an opportunity to put his ideas into practice, even at a relatively small scale & associated with relatively modest reforms of the JRC’s overall focus. The above cited COM(72) 700 goes on to describe the various new roles sought for the JRC, which included ‘public service’ (including ‘protection of the environment’ – a detailed program of work concerned with monitoring & controlling pollution).
Overall we could say that Spinelli had a fairly coherent vision of institutions needed to wield science; he recognized the need to create legal entities with actual powers defined in law, staff, and budgets e.g., ERDA & ESF, etc.; perhaps he knew these entities needed to be given a degree of autonomy to evolve through time as experience accrued and policy goals shifted. CERD, & the Commission, was perhaps to be the ‘brain’ of the operation, but this was not as far as I can see a centralized command structure; it was a flexible scheme of semi-autonomous entities. Pure guesswork here, but this is what I take him to mean by the phrase ‘capable intellectual instrument’.
The idea was for the most part brought down by certain member states committed to science & technology policies conceived primarily at a national level. As it was never given a chance, it is impossible to appraise.
Spinelli: rebooted
The above are just notes; I have little grasp of the wider context (we have not even looked at other Commission DGs that wielded science, such as Simonet’s energy portfolio); or the subsequent history, not to mention current political realities in Brussels.
Prof. Vincenzo Russo called in 2015 for some of the ideas espoused by Spinelli in the 1970s on industrial policy to be implemented as they still seemed germane to our current predicament. His argument was a convincing one; he had participated in conferences with Spinelli as an expert at the time.
A lot of history has obviously happened since the time discussed above. That said, there do seem to be some constants that persist to the present, confirming the idea that innovation policy is not always particularly innovative. Rarely, I guess, have such clear-cut & intellectually coherent visions been articulated as by Spinelli & Dahrendorf (& with such obvious bureaucratic consequences ensuing).
The JRC now focuses on many topics besides nuclear research, as Spinelli hoped. ERDA (his proposed research management agency) seems to exist in some relatively minimal form via the Research Executive Agency (REA). There is a European Science Foundation, although it is not associated with the EU; perhaps the European Research Council (ERC) is the better approximation. The European Commission certainly has plenty of groups that approximate functions of the CERD. One significant development that Spinelli did not anticipate but perhaps would have liked are the EU executive agencies, such as EMA & ECDC (which undertake significant scientific activities across health, environmental and other fields, and, being legally established entities separate from the Commission exhibit some form of autonomy).
However, looked at in other ways, the Spinelli vision has not been realized; it feels, overall, like the ‘capable intellectual instrument’ has yet to arrive. The EU is unable to undertake coherent scientific action under its own control; the legal or institutional framework is not there. It is not able to lead actions at the European level with national funding programs or institutions cast in a supporting role – far from it. While one could say the EU does have its own scientific capacity, via the JRC, EU-ANSA (EU executive agencies), etc., these entities are not obviously wielded in a coherent, strategically-aligned, way. The REA is not NASA, etc. Where NASA-like agencies exist in Europe, e.g. CERN, EMBO, & ESA, they are not part of the EU.
We can also probably say that Spinelli’s vision of the JRC as integral to R&D policy, autonomous, etc., has not been fulfilled. The recent re-branding of the JRC as the ‘Commission’s knowledge & science service’, might in an ideal world have been cast more widely to say the citizens’ knowledge & science service – or at least the EU’s knowledge & science service.
The current Commission President, von der Leyen, today (16 Sep 2020) called for the creation of a European version of BARDA (a US agency agency concerned with biomedical R&D), alongside greater powers for the ECDC & EMA. Von der Leyen is one of the few European politicians to have grasped what the covid crisis meant right from the start, and her proposals are intended to address the deficits that the crisis exposed (see: here). But her proposal speaks to the fact it is still impossible for the EU to wield science across the board (the contrast with the US government agencies is obvious and worth making; that is why they always seem to provide the models).
One does not have to travel far, though, to find decentralized, multipurpose R&D models that the EU could adopt. Where is the European version of Fraunhofer/Helmholtz/Leibniz, etc.? By this I mean a pan-European network of application-oriented R&D centers directed at societal problems. It is an unexplored legal point what such a network would look like; indeed, as far as I am aware, no such enterprise has been considered.
The €100bn Horizon Europe proposal recently fell somewhat flat (it was cut). In a Europe struggling with covid, falling output, rising unemployment, etc., abstract research missions seem to me out of step with reality. Instead, we might need to find R&D goals more relevant & tangible to the lives of citizens.
The European economy will only merit birth if it is better than the national economies it wants to replace.
Spinelli, undated, Postface au livre de M. Toulemon “Une politique industrielle communautaire” (AS-203 Discours prononcés par Altiero Spinelli en tant que commissaire CEE, vol. 2)
Note on sources
Segal, 1975, In person: Europe’s R&D men, in: New Scientist, 1 February 1973
Spinelli, 1966, The Eurocrats
Spinelli, Rome speech, 29 January 1976, L’industrie européenne peut-elle survivre?
Ina Lee Selden, 1977, Confessions of a Eurocommunist, in: European Community, pp. 7-10: ‘The Communists, and no others, made me a reasonable offer, that I appreciated and seized [to become an MEP]. I’m neither a Communist nor a member of any other party. I’ve always worked with the party that gave me the best opportunity to carry through my ideas. I supported De Gasperi when the Christian Democrats first took up the fight for Europe after the War. I backed the Socialists for the same reasons and was an aide to Nenni when he was Minister of Foreign Affairs, and I supported the Communists when they decided to adopt the European policy. I became a European Community Commissioner when the center-left Government offered me the opportunity to act for Europe.’
Haworth, Rhetoric & controversy, European Community, June-July 1972, p. 17: ‘Eurocrats privately admitted that, unless the United Kingdom can spur action on an industrial policy, the Community could degenerate into an agricultural club with pretentious political aspirations.’
Industrial Research & Technology, 23 January 1973, No. 173, p. 2: ‘After nearly 10 hours of discussion, the ministers decided to continue the effort to align their points of view at a further meeting of the Council of Ministers, scheduled for 5 February 1973.’
Layton, 1972, Industrial policy: maintaining momentum, in: European Community, pp. 9-10
Documentation européenne serie pedagogique 72/2
Historical Archives of the EU, Research Guides: R&D
AS.E Commissaire CEE politique industrielle et recherche
Segal, 1973, Rethinking a European science policy, New Scientist, 13 May 1973, pp. 530-531
Glencross & Trechsel, 2010, EU Federalism and Constitutionalism: the Legacy of Altiero Spinelli
Banchoff, 2002, The Politics of the European Research Area, ACES Working Paper
Guzzetti, 1995, A Brief History of European Union Research Policy
Dresner, et al., 2001, The Dynamics of European Science and Technology Policies
Delanghe, et al., 2009, European Science and Technology Policy: Towards Integration Or Fragmentation?
Krige & Guzzetti, 1997, History of European Scientific and Technological Cooperation
Ruberti & André, 1995, Un espace européen de la science: réflexions sur la politique européenne de recherche
Pinder, 2007, Altiero Spinelli’s European federal odyssey, in: The International Spectator
Speech by Spinelli; Conference: Industry & Society in the European Community, Venice, 20 April 1972:
- How can the skills of European technology be applied in a joint effort to develop new, ‘non-contaminating technologies’ (referring to the need to reduce environmental pollution), to develop new materials & recycling technologies, etc.
- An industrial policy marked by greater industrial & ‘shop-floor’ democracy, workers’ control Mitbestimmung, shared decision-making, etc.
- Transfer of Community resources to less-favored regions of Europe; ‘far greater transfers of wealth to developing countries than hereto’
- More risk capital was needed for ‘forward-looking enterprises of high growth potential, capable of cross-frontier development. These will need ‘judicious backing with common public funds’.
- There was a need for ‘common decision making centers which are both efficient and representative’. The present Community institutions were not adequate for the task, e.g., ‘the nuclear policy has been an almost complete failure for lack of a global policy for research and for scientific and technological development’.
- Legislative and financial decisions across the fields of ‘regional, industrial, technological and ecological’ must not only be taken by individual governments, but by the European Parliament (with ‘full powers of co-decision as the sole guarantee of popular consensus and hence European democratic legitimization of any action taken’).
Haas, et al., 1977, Scientists and World Order: The Uses of Technical Knowledge in International Organizations, p. 172: ‘The two proposals differed with respect to the extent of centralism and sociotechnological holism which inspired them. The Spinelli proposal had the backing of the governments of Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands. It stressed the organic links among the various technologies and branches of knowledge, and it favored a centralized approach to making decisions about these matters, focusing on E.C. institutions. This approach was opposed by Britain, France and Germany, who favored the Dahrendorf proposal because it seemed to permit separate decisions by sectors, left open the question of what would be financed and managed nationally, and put the Communities in the position of coordinator rather than ruler. Those who backed the Spinelli proposal were looking for collective measures to make up for what they considered their lack of national capacity; France and Germany simply sought to supplement by collective means what they could do less well nationally, without having to give up such natural advantages as they thought they possessed.’
Science Think Tank 