At the same time, however, the reality of global politics and geo-economics means that there are increasingly areas of tension that involve science and technology.¹ In the openness vs security dilemma, the rise in tensions between certain countries is leading to move the balance towards greater security, with traditionally open and liberal countries shifting their stance. Canada, for instance, has been applying a new “Policy on Sensitive Technology Research and Affiliations of Concern” since the beginning of 2024.²

Negotiations over the location of key science projects such as the Future Circular Collider are all potential sources of conflict and competition: science diplomacy is being used to leverage national and regional power, calling into question the mainstream vision of science diplomacy as inherently at the service of peace.

The attempts at influence go both ways, however. Numerous nations (and groups of nations, such as the EU) have created “tech ambassador” roles and deployed these representatives to gather information, lobby and negotiate in Silicon Valley and other technology hubs around the world.³

Sometimes, technology diplomacy has to operate where the lines between nation-states and private companies are blurred, as with China’s Huawei and ZTE. There are also issues with technology companies offering a country a competitive edge or working in areas that involve national security sensitivities, such as supercomputing hardware. Here, tech diplomats must tread the fine line between corporate freedoms, global balances of power and issues of national interest — often with incomplete information due to the unwillingness of all parties to fully disclose all the relevant data.

In some regions, where regulatory environments are weak, lobbyists, activists and grass-roots organisations are pushing the boundaries of science with their work on anti-ageing therapies and gene editing, some of which can influence regulatory policy-making, and sometimes accelerate the pace of change. Even small-scale companies, if they are significant employers in a region, can influence local political decision-making and tech-related legislation.

All of these various initiatives demonstrate the rising importance of transnational, non-state and even individual or small-group actors to local and global governance, something that the field of science and tech diplomacy must navigate. ^{4 5}

There are, however, significant collaborations that involve exclusively emerging economies. Intergovernmental science organisations such as the African Lightsource, the Synchrotron-Light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East (SESAME) — a joint undertaking of Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Egypt, Jordan, Iran, Pakistan, Turkey and Cyprus — and the Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency are all good examples of nations with emerging economies engaging in multilateral science diplomacy on their own terms.

The value of such endeavours in establishing credentials for global engagement is clear from South Africa’s success with the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), a radio-telescope project that is showcasing the nation’s science and engineering talent, creating programmes to further develop its human capital and burnishing its reputation as a rising power on the world economic and intellectual stage. Although there are hurdles to overcome, there are clear reasons to encourage and pursue more such inclusive collaborations between countries of differing economic means.⁸ At the same time, more and more emerging economies are taking an interest in science diplomacy as a means of moving towards greater scientific and technological development

Science is certainly affected by conflict. The war in Ukraine, for example, has hindered some collaborations between scientists of different nations: because of Russia’s geographical position, these stymied collaborations are having direct effects on Arctic science and are likely to affect protections against exploitation of Arctic resources.⁹

Science has recently become part of broader policies of sanctions between nation-states, as technology has become an interestingly important element of successful economies. More positively, it may be possible for scientists — working with science-diplomacy resources — to become drivers of positive change, shaping global research to give more equitable benefit from the outcomes of science.