Whatfactors determine the nature and pace of technological development? The literature on social construction of technology and actor-network theory suggests that assembling "coalitions" of support and conveying a certain "rhetoric " of technology are important to moving technology forward They are especially crucial strategies for advocates of large-scale, government-supported technologies. These strategies are illuminated by cases of U.S. space satellite development: meteorological satellites, land satellites, and the Earth Observation System . Developing a new technology is almost always a complicated affair, given the myriad technical uncertainties. The expense of large-scale technologies increases economic uncertainties. When a technology has government as its primary developer, a host of political uncertainties compound the dilemma. Political problems arise when one agency is responsible for development and another agency or industry is the user, when there is debate over the role of the government, and when users disagree among themselves and with the developer agency. Such issues, as well as the short-term electoral pressures felt by many public officials, add political uncertainty to government-sponsored technological change. They make the design of the technology problematic. Political conflict can prevent a technology from being successfully developed ; or, if developed, fruitfully applied.
Government, Politics, and Social ConstructionAuthors who discuss the social construction of technology see little merit in the view that technology has a life of its own, or develops autonomously.