Materials Research Spokesgroup Dialogue
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Spring Forum Held at NAS"
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Robb Thomson (NBS), Paul Holloway (University of Florida), and Elton Kaufmann (LawrenceLivermore National Laboratory) tackled the task of identifying individuals from as wide a variety of materials constituencies as possible. They contacted some 28 technical societies,* asking these societies to suggest participants who reflected their materials research interests. It was emphasized that the resulting 25 attendees** would not be regarded as official representatives of the societies that identified them and that the gathering itself, which made use of MRS Spring Meeting facilities, was not an official MRS function. Though this group was far more diverse than the one that gathered in December, the consensus here was also that no single broadly representative spokesgroup for materials research exists. But, the agreement went beyond that to the realization that no clear and simple route to the creation of such a group could be identified. The interests and priorities of the far-flung fields of materials science and engineering are simply too disparate for a single entity to speak authoritatively for the community as a whole. In arriving at this conclusion, the attendees discussed a variety of existing bodies which already play spokesgroup roles. Included were the confederations of societies such as the Federation of Materials Societies {see "Report on FMS Workshop on Electronic Materials" in this issue), A m e r i c a n
Association of Engineering Societies, American Institute of Physics, American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers, and more. Also discussed were the large number of boards and committees of the National
Academies, the advisory groups created by funding agencies, and a plethora of ad hoc working and study groups that arise for specific issues. It was generally agreed that these groups often function well as honest brokers for their particular constituencies oras study teams on topics of limited scope. However, it was also pointed out that often members of these groups are chosen without input from individual scientists from the materials community, and that the community at large perceives itself as generally uninformed about the activities of thesegroupsand unrepresented in them. Several other observations by individual participants are worth noting: 1. The technical societies have grown up as distinct organizations covering specific areas as a result of technical (as opposed to political) needs. Therefore, these societies have self-defined interests, organizational structures, and restrictions which render them less effective (as a group) in providing government with answers to materialsrelated questions as they arise. Related to this is the explicit stricture against lobbying by tax-exempt nonprofit societies. Also, for a membership organization with constitutionally elected governors to express
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