414 J.-A. PEMBERTON
Needham and Huxley prevailed. Wilkinson, who had been elected chair
of the London Conference, announced on the first day of the conference
that the British delegation would be calling for science’s recognition in
the title. The other delegations soon fell into line.^265
In explaining the reason for her announcement, Wilkinson stated that
‘when we are all wondering, perhaps apprehensively, what the scientists
will do to us next, it is important that they should be linked closely with
the humanities and should feel that they have responsibility to mankind
for the result of their labours.’^266 This observation touched on a very
important reason for the stress laid on science in the context of establish-
ing UNESCO: the lethal union of ‘psychopathic nationalism’ and sophisti-
cated military technology to which Second World War had borne witness.
This was a union of which the founders of UNESCO were deeply con-
scious: a major part of their aim was to ensure that science and its fruits
were not put to destructive ends but rather, as groups such as the Social
Relations of Science urged, served the cause of social progress.^267 As indi-
cated by Wilkinson’s observation above, this concern had been power-
fully reinforced by the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki.^268
Johnson, who served as technical secretary to the delegation of the
United States, observed that overall, the London Conference was con-
ducted in a cooperative and efficient manner. Issuing from the confrères’
cooperative efforts was a document entitled Instrument Establishing a
Preparatory Commission for the United Nations Educational Scientific
(^265) Sewell, UNESCO and World Politics, 78.
(^266) UNESCO Preparatory Commission, Conference for the Establishment of the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, 24. See also Sewell, UNESCO
and World Politics, 78–9.
(^267) Johnson, ‘The Origins of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization,’ 441. Johnson claims that the union between fanatical nationalist and tech-
nology was a ‘major force’ behind the foundation of UNESCO (ibid.). Thibaud Boncourt
notes that it was clear from the outset that UNESCO intended that the ‘young social sciences
were to be a tool for controlling the natural sciences, following on from the disillusionment
brought on by their exploitation for military purposes.’ Thibaud Boncourt, ‘Political Science,
a Postwar Product (1947–1949),’ Participation 33, no. 1 (2009): 4–7, 4.
(^268) Sewell, UNESCO and World Politics, 78–9. On the impact of the atomic bomb see also
E. F. Armstrong, ‘United Nations Educational and Cultural Organisation: Introduction,’
Nature 156, no. 3967 (1945), 553. E. F. Armstrong was an adviser to delegates of the
British government.