Science

Smallpox (known as "variole" or "petite vérole" in French) spread relentlessly across Europe during the eighteenth century gaining an unprecedented and deadly momentum. While there was no cure for this highly infectious and often fatal disease those that recovered from it were immune to future infections. This phenomenon was the origin of a practice of inoculation whereby infectious material was introduced into the body to induce immunity. In Europe this practice was initially experimented with in England and it was subsequently adopted across the continent during the eighteenth century. Inoculation was however not without controversy—not least because the practice originated outside of Europe—and it became the subject of intense debate. This debate this volume argues extended beyond medical circles to include intellectuals and the broader public—a phenomenon driven by a growing periodical press. As books scientific treatises and plays crossed regional and national boundaries debates on inoculation must this volume shows be examined within a European transnational perspective thereby considering how ideas were shaped by adaptation translations and citation. Doing so this volume not only sheds new light on the history inoculation as a practice but also illustrates how cultural history can enrich history of medicine

In the early 1970s while China was emerging from the height of the Cultural Revolution a surprising technology helped pave the way for the future rapprochement between China and the United States: the acupuncture needle. As an ostensibly apolitical practice acupuncture came to serve as a scientific lubricant that eased the Cold War tensions between the two countries providing an entryway into Sino-American people-to-people exchanges and future intellectual collaboration. At the same time acupuncture represented an alternative imagining of a new world order one in which scientific knowledge could just as easily flow from East to West as it did the reverse. By showcasing China’s ability to break new ground in the realm of medicine and surgery acupuncture became a form of soft power that highlighted the innovative capacity of Chinese communism and the revolutionary potential of Mao Zedong Thought. Through the captivating achievements of new needling technologies the Chinese government was able to not just extol the effectiveness of Maoism on a global scale but to also — albeit briefly — direct the terms of its diplomatic engagements with the capitalist West.

This paper examines the co-production of knowledge-making and health diplomacy in the course of implementing the Japanese family planning overseas development aid program ‘Integration Project’ (integurēshon purojekuto インテグレーション・プロジェクト) known as the ‘Three-in-One Project’ (sanjiehe xiangmu三结合项目) in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The analysis focuses on the historical background to this program and the actual process toward its implementation. The paper argues that the implementation of the ‘Integration Project’ as the ‘three-in-one project’ in the PRC was more than just a simple act of linguistic translation. Rather it shows how this involved epistemological and political negotiations that resulted from the specific ways in which healthcare advocacy and diplomacy were arranged in a constellation that involved Japan PRC and organizations active in the sphere of international governance since the 1970s as the political contours of the Cold War were changing significantly.

The emergence and rapid advancement of space technology during the Cold War led to heated discussions about the geopolitical and legal framework of a world expanding into the stars as nations grappled with the implications of their newfound capabilities. During the early years of space exploration the competition for ownership access and use of outer space ignited multilateral debates involving not only the United States and the Soviet Union but also alternative discourses expectations and experiences from various stakeholders. This intricate web of cosmic diplomacy significantly contributed to the formation of a legal order for outer space. This chapter analyses the political legal and technoscientific arguments put forward by African Southeast Asian and Latin American representatives in international fora regarding the regulation of activities in a particular strip of outer space. It uses the development of a regulatory framework for the geostationary orbit (GEO) as a case study in which to explore this alternative perspective. It shows how equatorial countries pushed for a regulatory regime in space that accounted for the vertical dimension of national sovereignty. Drawing upon principles of decolonization internationalism and scientific cooperation their central argument advocated equal access to outer space for non-spacefaring countries. The analysis follows these negotiations by examining the records of the United Nations the proceedings of its Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) and the first and second declarations of the equatorial countries (1976 and 1982) which staked their sovereignty claims over the GEO.