sufficient to remark that some of the most impressive deployments of macroengineering have already taken place in the arena of outer space. In the nineteenth century, it was still possible to regard giant engineering enterprises as exceptional feats: the Suez Canal, the transcontinental railways of the United States, Canada, Australia and latterly Russia, were objects of admiration and wonder but were certainly not commonplace events. Today, we must regard macroengineering as prototypical: more and more of the world’s work is being accomplished by gigantic industrial enterprises, whether we like it or not; and this is true regardless of social systems, political preferences or geography. Like all new social facts, this proliferation of large-scale engineering will require new concepts and attitudes if this heightened power of accomplishment is to contribute positively to human welfare. Entropy remains an inescapable factor. As Georg von Lengerke Meyer said a century ago, “Things alter for the worse spontaneously unless altered for the better designedly.” With what resources can the sectors of scholarship and management approach such matters? There are, of course, two sets of questions: on the practical level, people are given assignments to plan and manage projects and programs which are often unprecedented in scope and consequence; regardless of theoretical considerations, the work must be done, and people with assignments to be carried out will seek knowledge of analogous cases, and management models of all sorts which promise insights and advantages in coordination and control. On the more general level there are policy problems of a long-range nature: which are the enterprises to be encouraged or discouraged; what are the criteria for selection or rejection; what are the priorities for public investment; what are the lifestyles which our new physical arrangements are intended to foster. Macro-engineering investments are preclusive; they imply basic choices among competing systems and values; once in place, they are apt to last a very long time. That there is increasing recognition of the high importance of both types of question is evidenced by the attention given in recent years to studies of macroengineering in many parts of the world. The French review Futurihles devotes its current issue to this entire matter. In the United Kingdom, a Major Projects Association (ably represented at this meeting) holds regular sessions at the Oxford Centre for Management Studies under the distinguished guidance of Uwe Kitzinger. In Japan, due to the pioneering leadership of Professor Manabu Nakagawa, three organizations devoted to different aspects of macro-engineering enjoy wide support and influence. Perhaps I should say a word about the emergence of comprehensive macro-engineering studies in the United States. For the past twelve years, courses and seminars on macro-engineering have been held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1978, 1979, and 1980, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (A AAS) sponsored symposia on the subject in connection with its Annual Meetings. The papers presented at the first two Meetings have been published in a series of books distributed by the Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado. It is relevant to our present pre-occupation with UNISPACE affairs to mention that the macro-engineering session held in 1980 has now been published by the American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), cosponsor of the series. And the Westview Press has recently issued a volume reflecting papers submitted to the international macro-engineering seminar held in June, 1981, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A number of other publications have appeared or are in progress, and an American society for macroengineering is to be launched later this year. Those of us concerned with such activities will welcome contacts and information
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