Freedom's Laboratory: The Cold War Struggle for the Soul of Science

by Audra J. Wolfe

Overview

The Cold War ended long ago, but the language of science and freedom continues to shape public debates over the relationship between science and politics in the United States.

Scientists like to proclaim that science knows no borders. Scientific researchers follow the evidence where it leads, their conclusions free of prejudice or ideology. But is that really the case? In Freedom's Laboratory, Audra J. Wolfe shows how these ideas were tested to their limits in the high-stakes propaganda battles of the Cold War.

Wolfe examines the role that scientists, in concert with administrators and policymakers, played in American cultural diplomacy after World War II. During this period, the engines of US propaganda promoted a vision of science that highlighted empiricism, objectivity, a commitment to pure research, and internationalism. Working (both overtly and covertly, wittingly and unwittingly) with governmental and private organizations, scientists attempted to decide what, exactly, they meant when they referred to "scientific freedom" or the "US ideology." More frequently, however, they defined American science merely as the opposite of Communist science.

Uncovering many startling episodes of the close relationship between the US government and private scientific groups, Freedom's Laboratory is the first work to explore science's link to US propaganda and psychological warfare campaigns during the Cold War. Closing in the present day with a discussion of the 2017 March for Science and the prospects for science and science diplomacy in the Trump era, the book demonstrates the continued hold of Cold War thinking on ideas about science and politics in the United States.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781421439082
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date:	08/04/2020
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Audra J. Wolfe is a Philadelphia-based writer, editor, and historian. She is the author of Competing with the Soviets: Science, Technology, and the State in Cold War America. Her work has appeared in the Washington Post, The Atlantic, and the podcast American History Tellers.

Table of Contents

Introduction
1. Western Science vs. Marxist Science
2. Ambassadors for Science
3. A War of Ideas
4. Science and Freedom
5. Science for Peace
6. Science for Diplomacy
7. Developing Scientific Minds
8. An Unscientific Reckoning
9. Scientists' Rights are Human Rights
Epilogue

What People are Saying About This

Rush Holt

A wonderful, well-researched book evoking deep questions of science, freedom, and democracy.

Ronald E. Doel

Marvelously crafted, terse, and sprightly, Freedom's Laboratory is also original, utilizing new archival material and drawing on a wide and impressive range of primary and secondary sources. One of the first full-length treatments of the relationship of science, American democracy, and foreign policy, the book will appeal to broadly educated general readers and will very likely be widely utilized in courses on the Cold War and recent science.

Mary L. Dudziak

In this fascinating and deeply researched work, Audra Wolfe reveals the role of science in US cultural diplomacy, showing the way the idea that science was politically neutral enabled the pursuit of forms of scientific internationalism that served US Cold War interests. An important contribution.

From the Publisher

Marvelously crafted, terse, and sprightly, Freedom's Laboratory is also original, utilizing new archival material and drawing on a wide and impressive range of primary and secondary sources. One of the first full-length treatments of the relationship of science, American democracy, and foreign policy, the book will appeal to broadly educated general readers and will very likely be widely utilized in courses on the Cold War and recent science.
—Ronald E. Doel, coeditor of Exploring Greenland: Cold War Science and Technology on Ice

In Freedom's Laboratory, Audra Wolfe does a remarkable job resurrecting the covert and overt ways during the Cold War that the CIA and the US government influenced science—and the way science, in turn, influenced the Cold War, from Iowa cornfields to genetics to biology textbooks. In doing so, she offers an important meditation on the true boundaries and meaning of 'scientific freedom' in the titanic battle between the United States and the Soviet Union. Writing with the eye of a journalist and the authority of a scholar, Wolfe delivers a compelling new look behind the curtain of a still shadowy moment in history.
—Garrett M. Graff, author of Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government's Secret Plan to Save Itself—While the Rest of Us Die

In this fascinating and deeply researched work, Audra Wolfe reveals the role of science in US cultural diplomacy, showing the way the idea that science was politically neutral enabled the pursuit of forms of scientific internationalism that served US Cold War interests. An important contribution.
—Mary L. Dudziak, author of War Time: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences

A wonderful, well-researched book evoking deep questions of science, freedom, and democracy.
—Rush Holt, American Association for the Advancement of Science

Garrett M. Graff

In Freedom's Laboratory, Audra Wolfe does a remarkable job resurrecting the covert and overt ways during the Cold War that the CIA and the US government influenced science—and the way science, in turn, influenced the Cold War, from Iowa cornfields to genetics to biology textbooks. In doing so, she offers an important meditation on the true boundaries and meaning of 'scientific freedom' in the titanic battle between the United States and the Soviet Union. Writing with the eye of a journalist and the authority of a scholar, Wolfe delivers a compelling new look behind the curtain of a still shadowy moment in history.

Editorial Reviews

A strong contribution to the history of modern science.
--Kirkus Reviews, starred review

Audra Wolfe's provocative new book, Freedom's Laboratory, dives into the fascinating history of why asserting the apolitical nature of science became a political priority during another notably politicized period in America's past: the Cold War.
--Science

Carefully researched works on the Cultural Cold War, like Freedom's Laboratory, reveal what a murky world we have inherited. Scientists fighting against restrictions on their profession used the language of crusading anti-Communism, defining their work as apolitical and therefore free. But it was neither. The point is not, as Wolfe argues clearly, that 'freedom' is an impossible value to hold, nor that scientific internationalism isn't worth defending, nor that the fiction of apolitical science means that science is better off being relentlessly politicized. The point, rather, is that power and knowledge are always entwined. During the Cold War, American institutions were assumed to be ideal by default. We now know more than enough to understand that they were not, and that the task of making them better belongs to us.
--New Republic

Cold-war history, Wolfe writes, is not a heroes-and-villains narrative: it must be told in 'shades of gray.' The government used scientists' ideals for its own political reasons. And the scientists, who saw themselves as apolitical, used the government's political messages and support to question, observe, conclude, write and speak--freely and in accord with their ideals.
--Nature

Explores the science of the Cold War beyond its more tangible role in developing weapons. Instead, Wolfe focuses on science as propaganda, part of America's psychological offensive designed to convince people to buy into American ideology. She traces the perception that science should be free and unimpeded by borders and politics to this era.
--The Verge

Historian Wolfe offers a thoughtful, thoroughly researched history of how the American government employed science and scientists to improve world opinion of liberal democracy during the Cold War . . . [R]eaders with an interest in the conjunction of science and politics will find her book an informative one.
--Publishers Weekly, starred review

It is hard to imagine a history of science that is more timely than one that situates our current political environment in the context of the Cold War . . . Wolfe's text is essential reading for both students and scientists who have been immersed in the idea of science as an apolitical pursuit.
--Physics Today

One of the common misbeliefs about science is that it is apolitical. Actually, as historian Wolfe reveals in her well-researched and closely argued study, during the Cold War, American scientists were often deeply involved in promoting American cultural values to other parts of the world in an effort to defeat the communists at the same game. An excellent study on a topic that deserves more attention.
--Library Journal

This book is a well-written and information-packed account of science's roles in American culture and diplomacy during the cold war and its denouement. [A] strength is the depth and breadth of the archival and historical research offered.
--Metascience

Wolfe's new book, Freedom's Laboratory, frontally addresses questions of what science is, how it is best done, and how it (and scientists themselves) might be strategically deployed to advance national interests.
--LA Review of Books

Test DBR

From the Publisher

Cold-war history, Wolfe writes, is not a heroes-and-villains narrative: it must be told in 'shades of gray.' The government used scientists' ideals for its own political reasons. And the scientists, who saw themselves as apolitical, used the government's political messages and support to question, observe, conclude, write and speak—freely and in accord with their ideals.

Nature Lib

Wolfe's new book, Freedom's Laboratory, frontally addresses questions of what science is, how it is best done, and how it (and scientists themselves) might be strategically deployed to advance national interests.

LA Review of Books

Carefully researched works on the Cultural Cold War, like Freedom's Laboratory, reveal what a murky world we have inherited. Scientists fighting against restrictions on their profession used the language of crusading anti-Communism, defining their work as apolitical and therefore free. But it was neither. The point is not, as Wolfe argues clearly, that 'freedom' is an impossible value to hold, nor that scientific internationalism isn't worth defending, nor that the fiction of apolitical science means that science is better off being relentlessly politicized. The point, rather, is that power and knowledge are always entwined. During the Cold War, American institutions were assumed to be ideal by default. We now know more than enough to understand that they were not, and that the task of making them better belongs to us.

New Republic

Explores the science of the Cold War beyond its more tangible role in developing weapons. Instead, Wolfe focuses on science as propaganda, part of America's psychological offensive designed to convince people to buy into American ideology. She traces the perception that science should be free and unimpeded by borders and politics to this era.

The Verge

It is hard to imagine a history of science that is more timely than one that situates our current political environment in the context of the Cold War . . . Wolfe's text is essential reading for both students and scientists who have been immersed in the idea of science as an apolitical pursuit.

Physics Today

"Cold-war history, Wolfe writes, is not a heroes-and-villains narrative: it must be told in 'shades of gray.' The government used scientists' ideals for its own political reasons. And the scientists, who saw themselves as apolitical, used the government's political messages and support to question, observe, conclude, write and speak—freely and in accord with their ideals."

Nature

Audra Wolfe's provocative new book, Freedom's Laboratory, dives into the fascinating history of why asserting the apolitical nature of science became a political priority during another notably politicized period in America's past: the Cold War.

Science

This book is a well-written and information-packed account of science's roles in American culture and diplomacy during the cold war and its denouement. [A] strength is the depth and breadth of the archival and historical research offered.

Metascience

"Audra Wolfe's provocative new book, Freedom's Laboratory, dives into the fascinating history of why asserting the apolitical nature of science became a political priority during another notably politicized period in America's past: the Cold War."

Science

"This book is a well-written and information-packed account of science's roles in American culture and diplomacy during the cold war and its denouement. [A] strength is the depth and breadth of the archival and historical research offered."

Metascience - George A. Reisch

"Carefully researched works on the Cultural Cold War, likeFreedom's Laboratory, reveal what a murky world we have inherited. Scientists fighting against restrictions on their profession used the language of crusading anti-Communism, defining their work as apolitical and therefore free. But it was neither. The point is not, as Wolfe argues clearly, that 'freedom' is an impossible value to hold, nor that scientific internationalism isn't worth defending, nor that the fiction of apolitical science means that science is better off being relentlessly politicized. The point, rather, is that power and knowledge are always entwined. During the Cold War, American institutions were assumed to be ideal by default. We now know more than enough to understand that they were not, and that the task of making them better belongs to us."

New Republic - Patrick Iber

"It is hard to imagine a history of science that is more timely than one that situates our current political environment in the context of the Cold War... Wolfe's text is essential reading for both students and scientists who have been immersed in the idea of science as an apolitical pursuit."

Physics Today - Chanda Prescod-Weinstein

"Explores the science of the Cold War beyond its more tangible role in developing weapons. Instead, Wolfe focuses on science as propaganda, part of America's psychological offensive designed to convince people to buy into American ideology. She traces the perception that science should be free and unimpeded by borders and politics to this era."

The Verge - Rachel Becker

"Wolfe's new book, Freedom's Laboratory, frontally addresses questions of what science is, how it is best done, and how it (and scientists themselves) might be strategically deployed to advance national interests."

LA Review of Books - W. Patrick McCray

"Cold-war history, Wolfe writes, is not a heroes-and-villains narrative: it must be told in 'shades of gray.' The government used scientists' ideals for its own political reasons. And the scientists, who saw themselves as apolitical, used the government's political messages and support to question, observe, conclude, write and speak — freely and in accord with their ideals."

Nature - Ann Finkbeiner

"Audra Wolfe's provocative new book, Freedom's Laboratory, dives into the fascinating history of why asserting the apolitical nature of science became a political priority during another notably politicized period in America's past: the Cold War."

Science - Alex Wellerstein

★ 2018-09-02

Of psy-ops, seismic detection, and other emanations of the Cold War as it was conducted in petri dishes and cyclotrons.

In this engaging and dense study of the politics of science in the Cold War era, historian Wolfe (Competing with the Soviets: Science, Technology, and the State in Cold War America, 2012) examines a puzzling paradox: In an era of McCarthy-ite redbaiting and witch-hunting, how could scientists with leftist affiliations keep on working on classified projects related to that struggle against the Communist bloc? The answer is that the era may not have been as thoroughly politicized as we think—or, in the case of at least one prominent researcher, "the US government embraced advocates of scientific freedom as spokespersons for American values." Just so, science was not necessarily oppositional: A scientist could support civil rights and other prematurely anti-fascist causes without by definition becoming an enemy of the state, and indeed many scientists took care to make clear distinctions between their personal views and their public objectivity. Well-funded by dozens of organizations that were in varying degrees dependent on the government—even as the government took care to pretend that they were all independent—these scientists fought the scientific Cold War on many fronts, engaging against Lysenko-ist notions of genetics here and doing thermonuclear research there. Even so, they engaged Soviet-bloc scientists in regular conferences, some specifically with an eye on promoting international cooperation and peace; they also participated in operations such as Pugwash, which "offered a reliable backchannel for diplomats and intelligence officers in both the United States and the Soviet Union" even as it purported to be made up of unaffiliated scientists. In the end, Wolfe suggests, scientific neutrality, when it comes to politics, may be a chimera, but even that doesn't matter much in an era when, in the U.S. government, "the structures of power no longer value independent thought, a common public good, or global opinion"—or indeed, science itself.

A strong contribution to the history of modern science.

Kirkus Reviews