Page 78 - Communication Commerce and Power The Political Economy of America and the Direct Broadcast Satellite

66 Communication, Commerce and Power

of private and, subsequently, public sector agents in the making of
communication policy. These interests, how they were expressed
through government offices, and how these pressures and mediations
in tum reshaped state foreign policy structures and outcomes are
questions that will be pursued in the next chapter. By examining
these developments, Chapter 4 begins the task of specifying how
American state structures affected and were affected by private sector
and intra-state forces.

NOTES
Delbert D. Smith, Communication via Satellite: A Vision in Retrospect
(Leyden: A.W. Sijthoff, 1976) p. 255.
2 For instance, in 1972 FCC commissioner Robert E. Lee argued in favor
of this development in a series of public speeches. See 'Lee Cites Need
Now to Start Shaping Ground Rules for Direct Satellites', in Broad-
casting (27 August 1973) 38.
3 Following the Second World War, the US military initiated classified
feasibility studies on the potential applications of earth-orbiting satellites.
But largely due to the absence of clear research objectives, coordinated
inter-agency planning and an overriding interest in ballistic missile devel-
opments, the only significant advancement made by the mid-1950s
involved launch vehicles. As for the social implications of telesatellite
technologies, the Rand Corporation in 1949 organized the first national
conference on the subject. One conference conclusion was the assumption
that 'the paramount utility of a satellite probably resides in its potential-
ities as an instrument for the achievement of political!psychological
goals,' Delbert D. Smith, Communication via Satellite, pp. 18-19 and 29.
4 See excerpts from US Senate, Committee on Aeronautical and Space
Sciences, Staff Report, 'The Background of United States Involvement,'
in Lloyd D. Musolf (ed.), Communications Satellites in Political Orbit
(San Francisco: Chandler, 1968) p. 13.
5 Sputnik's technological superiority was made most apparent by the fact
that its mass was nine times greater than the proposed American satellite
and its orbit reached twice the altitude of the NAS/DoD plan.
6 NASA was to become the largest and most active civilian space science
research agency in the world, although all its research related to US
defense would be the responsibility of the DoD. Other American
responses to Sputnik are summarized in Heather Hudson, Communica-
tion Satellites: Their Development and Impact (New York: Free Press,
1990) pp. 14-15.
7 'National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958.' Public Law 85-568, 85th
Cong., 72 Stat. 426, 29 July 1958. See discussion in Smith, Communica-
tion via Satellite, pp. 41-60.
8 Ibid., p. 63.