THE CHANGING PURPOSE OF THE SPACE STATION

摘要

The stated purpose of the space station has changed numerous times since the program took shape in the early years of the Ronald Reagan administration. It began as a multi-purpose facility motivated by a desire to match or exceed Soviet capabilities in human spaceflight. More recently, the George W. Bush administration has attempted to define it much more narrowly, as a laboratory to study human physiology for long-duration spaceflight in support of lunar settlements and journeys to Mars. This paper traces a quarter century of evolution in the rationale for NASA's "next logical step" and assesses the political motivations that drove the process. It demonstrates how the policy image of the space station, like civil space activities in general, changed in the view of successive presidents and Congresses in the post-Apollo era. The original image of national pride, Cold War rivalry, and technological achievement gave way to an image of the program as a competitor for scarce funding to support a fluctuating assortment of justifications such as job creation, economic stimulus, and spin-off benefits.