In summer 1945, four days after Japan’s official surrender, President Harry Truman floated an agency guided by “the free intelligence of the scientist” to fund investigations into how the world works. By 2024, the National Science Foundation provides about one in every 10 federal research dollars to U.S. universities, and its Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences division funds roughly 63% of academic research in psychological and social sciences. The Trump administration proposed halving the NSF budget and eliminating the SBE division in the next fiscal year, changes Congress must approve. Congress previously rejected drastic NSF cuts and warned against reducing any division’s federal research dollars by more than 5%. On April 24, Trump fired all 22 NSF board members who must approve major agency changes, and they have not been replaced. A White House spokesperson said the administration is committed to dominance in future cutting-edge technologies driven by hard sciences rather than ideologically driven “social sciences,” and NSF leaders told staff the SBE division would shut down.
#national-science-foundation #us-federal-research-funding #social-sciences #science-policy #trump-administration
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