18 - Young Scientists Summer Program Lecture - 04 June 2008

Kenneth Oye

Trends in Emerging Technologies:
Energy, Environment, and Development

Listen [MP3 1:46:01] Slides [PDF]

Lecture Summary

The pace of technology development and the global diffusion of technologies are both accelerating. Biological engineering, information technology, nano-technologies and other emerging technologies are advancing at exponential rates, and international access to such emerging technologies remains uneven but is improving. This presentation describes these trends, identifies some effects on the terms of tradeoffs across energy, environmental, and economic goals, and discusses implications for governments and firms. A first illustrative case will focus on the long term development of synthetic genomics and biofuels, with attention to public and private investments in development of technologies and to how intellectual property rights and security issues may have the effect of limiting diffusion of technologies. A second illustrative case will focus on the near term effects of energy efficiency regulations on the utilization of in-hand technologies for LDV and air conditioning, with analysis of effects on environment, energy, and the competitive position of firms. These cases will be used to set up informal discussion on implications for the strategies of public and private actors in rich, middle income, and poor nations.

Speaker Biography

Kenneth A. Oye is Associate Professor of Political Science at MIT. He served two terms as Director of the MIT Center for International Studies (1992-2000), and is now forming a Political Economy and Technology Policy Program within the Center. He has served on the faculties of the Kennedy School at Harvard University, the University of California, Princeton University, and Swarthmore College. He received the 1998 MIT Graduate Student Council Outstanding Teaching Award in Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts for his research seminar in international relations and the 2003 MIT Technology and Policy Program Faculty Appreciation Award for his teaching and advising in science, technology and public policy. He holds a BA in Political Science and Economics with Highest Honors from Swarthmore College and a Ph.D in Political Science with the Chase Dissertation Prize from Harvard University.

He has published six books including Cooperation Under Anarchy, Economic Discrimination and Political Exchange, and Eagle in a New World and numerous shorter pieces in international relations, political economy, and science and technology policy. His current research cuts across these fields, by using theory and methods from the field of political economy to address issues in the field of science, technology and environmental policy.

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