Rachel Rothschild (University of Michigan Law School) has posted A New Administrative Law for the Production of Scientific Knowledge (Forthcoming, Building Democratic Capacity: Essays on Administrative Law’s Futures, Cambridge University Press) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
Federal support for scientific research has paid enormous dividends to Americans from the mid-20th century to today. Investments in science have led to rapid advances in knowledge that have improved living standards, public health, and national security. The federal government has also benefited from expanded science advising on a host of important issues, whether nuclear weapons, contagious diseases, or environmental threats.
The second Trump administration’s withholding of research funds and reliance on unqualified experts have upended this partnership between science and the state. Though existing laws appeared to prohibit many of the administration’s actions, they provided insufficient legal protections for scientific research and government advisory committees. This chapter assesses the second Trump administration’s policies in the context of recent developments in administrative law doctrine. It argues that changes to several key federal statutes – the Tucker Act, the Impoundment Control Act, and the Federal Advisory Committee Act – could better insulate research funding from arbitrary recissions and ensure only qualified experts serve as science policy advisors. Through such reforms, Congress can check autocratic impulses in the Executive Branch and guard against the subordination of science for undemocratic ends.
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