Advisors to Aid Technology Research; Reuther, Goldberg Are Among Notables

A 29-man advisory committee has been formed to help evaluate and communicate the results of the University's Program on Technology and Society, a ten-year series of research projects on the impact of technology on various aspects of society.

The program was established last June under a $5 million grant from the IBM Corporation to inquire into the social, economic and political effects of rapid technological change.

Marvin Bower, managing director of McKinsey & Co., a prominent management consulting firm, will be chairman of the new advisory committee.

Members of the committee include Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg; Senator Gordon Allott (R-Colo.); Frank Stanton '36, president of Columbia Broadcasting System; AFL-CIO leaders George Meany and Walter P. Reuther; and Gerald Piel '37, editor and publisher of Scientific American.

Jerome Wiesner, former presidential science advisor, now dean of science at M.I.T., and prominent management representatives of the Xerox Corp., Lockheed Missiles and Space Co., the Polaroid Corp., and Continental Oil, are also on the Committee.

The program is sponsoring research on a wide range of topics dealing with technological revolution. Methods of forecasting new developments in technology and automation as well as the impact of these developments on labor and industrial structure are under consideration.

Government and Industry

Inquiries will also be made into the impact of technological change on decision-making in both government and private industry and on changing skill requirements in relation to educational policy.

Asked if any specific research projects had been completed, Emmanuel G. Mesthene, lecturer on business administration and executive director of the program, replied, "We're too young for that. However, he named John R. Meyer, professor of Economics, and Paul R. Lawrence, professor of Organizational Behavior, among those presently engaged in research.

According to Mesthene, the wide-ranging research endeavor will issue no single report.