Co-operative Research: An Organizational Response of Marine Science to the New Challenges

Three major factors contribute now to what can be described as technological, legal, and political challenges to contemporary marine science. The first factor could be attributed to the realisetion by the international community of the need to master the mineral resources of the ocean. As a result, new technologically sophisticated but prohibitively expensive methods of ocean bottom investigation have been elaborated. Another factor has evolved from the emerging customary sea law recently codified in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Its provisions establish impediments for the free conduct of marine research in almost 80 per cent of the scientifically most significant areas. Finally, this legal order also adds new elements to existing political tensions in the world. Legal provisions are applied to marine science for achieving purely political results and sometimes marine research itself becomes an instrument to that end. The challenges created by these factors can only be met by marine science if adequate forms of co-operative research are developed. Such forms should include technology sharing between researching nations and more active direct interaction between oceanographic groups and institutions across political boundaries.