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Britain's environmental overlord Peter Walker—in an exclusive interview with Richard Brooks—insists that pressure groups do not influence him greatly. In this article, following on from last month's feature on the way such American‐style groups are developing here, Walker and industrialists defend the company role.

All items listed may be borrowed from the Aslib Library, except those marked, which may be consulted in the Library.

The White Paper of 1972 is — as was the Robbins Report — a watershed in British higher education. By now, most readers of Education & Training will be familiar with one of its main provisions, namely that higher education is to expand overall to a total of 750,000 students by the end of the decade, and that the universities and the public sector are each to have some 375,000 students. There is thus to be at least equality of size in respect of full‐time and sandwich undergraduate students. The polytechnics are consequently to grow faster than the universities, but the rate of expansion of the latter is not to slow down drastically.

‘THE WORLD is becoming so complex that if a man stops his education when he leaves school, college or even professional school he is doomed to educational mediocrity.’ James B Conant, President, Harvard University.

The purpose of this paper is to give an insight into the thinking of the 1960s and at a time when subsequent advances and developments could not easily have been predicated with any degree of certainty. Provides an analysis and summary of “new concepts” of cybernetics and discusses their implications.

By presenting the essentials of this prize‐winning essay, considerations can be given to science and technology, the technological time lag; the status of technologists; industrial and academic research; the interaction of technologies; the cybernetic revolution; education and the environmental barrier; professional obsolescence; and the purpose of education.

This analysis and summary puts into perspective the historical background of the development of cybernetics and the 1960s concept of “general systems”, encountered by author.

Pays tribute to the foresight of Dr Rose at one of the most challenging periods in the development of these fields. The republication of these ideas in 2000 emphasised the accuracy of this predications of the 1960s.

The ten institutions called technological universities are an odd group. Two of them — the University of Wales Institute of Science and Technology (UWIST) and Chelsea College — are not universities at all, but colleges of federal universities. Only two of the remainder — Loughborough and Bath — have ‘technology’ in their titles. And Chelsea doesn't even concentrate on technology. The main thing they have in common is that they were all formerly colleges of advanced technology, and before that, technical colleges. The story of their development is one of the most remarkable in education. It is hard to find examples of where the intentions of founders have been so thoroughly submerged by the aspirations of their successors. The early ideals to provide educational opportunities for the working class, often allied with attempts to offer social facilities as well, have been increasingly eroded by the ambition of the colleges for self advancement and status. From technical colleges meeting local, social and industrial demands at all levels, they have developed into national institutions awarding degrees to an increasingly middle class clientele selected from the length and breadth of the country.

Posits that most contemporary interest in the university‐industry linkages stems from a concern to increase the birth rate of new technology‐based firms and/or the velocity with which indigenous scientific capability is translated into commercial technologies. Notes that many analysts of science parks and silicon valleys argue that this kind of knowledge‐based innovation requires cosmopolitan economic and social milieux with good communication links, easy access to air transport, highly educated workers and sophisticated cultural amenities. Argues that on the receiving end of contemporary innovation systems are indigenous and other disempowered groups and economically depleted communities with little stake in scientific and technical advancement and virtually no involvement in the policy or social networks set up to steer the knowledge system. Describes an experiment to discover processes by which marginalized, economically distressed communities can use institutions of the “knowledge economy” to foster the social and technological innovation necessary for their survival. Joins the University College of Cape Breton with universities in Mexico to form structured relationships with communities on Cape Breton Island and with a Mayan community on the Yucatán Peninsula. Bases techniques on searching for economic opportunities, construction of community business organizations, training, community development and supportive aftercare services to provide the three components of community economic regeneration: finance, technology and formation. Works to find ways to use the dynamics of triple helix innovation to construct knowledge systems that work in favour of the peripheral communities threatened by trade liberalization and the decline of resource regions. Specifically asks how can the institutions of the “knowledge economy” contribute to the development of a local sub‐economy that supports local businesses? Employs a social economy approach to the establishment of community businesses, differing from others in the community business movement in the belief that the “knowledge economy” can provide resources and eventual economic and social survivability to distressed regions. Argues that economic regeneration among marginal groups requires: access to improved production and organizational technologies; that universities can provide this access, especially in distressed communities; a transfer system usually has to be established; specific steps must be taken to establish new community businesses; and a maintenance system with specific characteristics must be established.

Planningof any kind can be motivated by a pressing practical problem which has to be solved—for example, an increasing number of people may have to be housed in the same area; or by a long‐term idealistic vision; or by both (the idealist seeing the long‐term implications of an immediate problem). In short‐term planning, the danger exists that the more technical problems may be solved, without attention to their implications for human beings; to take my housing example, higher and higher flats may be built, without considering the possible effects (e.g. the effect on social groupings). In long‐term planning, Utopian or ideological blueprints may be produced.

‘OH!’ said Miss Dartle, ‘Now I am glad to know that, I ask for information and I am glad to know it.’ You will recall that when David Copperfield went to bed a little later on that night he was haunted by Rosa Dartle and her questions. He found a startling likeness of her, looking eagerly at him from the chimney‐piece in his bedroom, and he wondered peevishly why they couldn't have put her anywhere else instead of quartering her on him. Though he undressed quickly, put out the light and got into bed, he couldn't forget that she was still there, looking. ‘Is it really, though?’ ‘I want to know’—and when he awoke in the night he found he was uneasily asking all sorts of people in his dreams whether it really was or not, without knowing what he meant.