The enactment in 1995 of the Fundamentals of Science and Technology Law made science and technology the first sector to pursue reforms for general activation of the Japanese society. Self-renovation of the network built up for 50 years is naturally difficult, but the manufacturing sector, which has now achieved the highest level in the world, is expected to play a leading role in the reform. Development of the manufacturing industry and technology should be accelerated by their interaction. The interaction should now be further intensified when new needs are being created by the environmental and energy situations. The Japanese manufacturing industry has strength rooted in the country's history and geography; it should survive any structural change of the indus-try. Creativity in science and technology is what universities and public research institutes should embody. The ecological system in which every species demonstrates wisdom and strength for survival should suggest much in searching for ways of reform and in discussing organizational climates. Apart from measures to enhance science and technology, the reform must also have foresight to control abuse of science by questioning their purposes and methodology, which should be one of the objects of our society.

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Although considerably strong in terms of the number of patents and research papers, Japanese science and technology still suffer from relatively poor quality. International relationship of the scientific community, particularly cooperation with Asian countries, ahs yet to be fully developed. Enhancement of Japanese science and technology will require increase in public financing and training of high-level researchers, e.g. those with doctor's degree. A system which deals flexibly with changes corresponding to general trends of science and technology and which permits recruiting and fostering high-level researchers including those from other countries. The "fundamental research" campaign in the last decade has actually resulted in overemphasis of fundamental sciences, although the concept meant originally the importance of creative aspect in every phase of any research. The research activities in national laboratories and laboratories of local authorities should be more focused on application-oriented development, leaving discovery-oriented research for universities long with education. The administration should be restructured to promote cooperation among different sections by a more effective coordination among them. Heightened activity of the Science and Technology Council and increasing administrators acquainted with scientific activities are other tasks imposed on the administrative sector.

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The present administrative system related to science and technology in Japan originates in the establishment of the Science Council of Japan and the Science and Technology Administration Council after WWII. Subsequently, the establishment of the Science and Technology Agency, along with the Science and Technology Council as the superior organ of consultation for science and technology policy, formed the basic framework of the today's system. Reform and promotion of the policymaking system have been discussed within this framework. Recently it has been recognized that the rigid administrative organization is not necessary the optimum solution. In addition, the needs for revitalization of economy through new industries and contribution to global problems require an innovative restructuring of the administration system. For this purpose, a unified system for the promotion of science and technology, comprising academic researchers, is desirable, as well as strengthening the policymaking function. A prerequisite is more flexible research organization in universities and national research laboratories.

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The Korean government developed its interest for technological R&D in 1990s, and established a policy for its full-fledged promotion, designated as "Strategic Plan for Technological Development", as a part of the New Five-Year Economic Plan started in 1993. The plan has three basic aims: industry-led innovation mechanism, demand-oriented technological development, and strategic promotion of national scale development programs. Several enhancements were made in administrative systems: The National Science and Technology Board was newly established as an advisory group for the President; the General Science and Technology Council, founded in 1972, was revitalized after a long dormant period; and restructuring of relevant administrative organizations was implemented in three times since 1993. The national R&D investment will increase up to 3-4% of GNP in 1998 from 1.94% in 1991. Four government-led R&D programs for innovative technologies have enjoyed by far the highest growth in budget: an average 10-20% up to 1992 and 36-51% thereafter. Education and training, information distribution, and legislative actions represent measures for establishing social infrastructure for technological R&D. A goal in education and training is formation of 140,000 highly skilled researchers by 1998. Other policies include promotion of independence of and competition among smaller businesses, as well as formation of specialized groups of "chaebol" (big concern) enterprises, aiming at acceleration of innovation and enhancement of international competitiveness through better-structured distribution of resources.

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Sweden's R&D investment has the highest share in the GDP in the world. The country's science and technology policy shows many differences with that of Japan, particularly in the role of universities. Swedish universities play the role of R&D centers of the industry. For big projects, the Swedish government limits itself to take measures that favor scientists and engineers instead of leading the projects. The present report describes basic features and present status of the science and technology policy of Sweden as compared with the Japanese conterpart.

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China is in a transition period from a planned economy to a market economy. The government recognizes that technology is a key to strengthen international competitiveness in gradually opening up the economy. China has a large stock of scientists and engineers and has invested much in science and technology. However, China has not made use of its science and technology stock well for industrial development. The paper analyzes the characteristics of the Chinese technology system that retains many characteristics of a planned economy. The separation of RD units and production units, ineffective technology transfer from RD units to production units, the low awareness of intellectual property rights, weak metrology and calibration infrastructures that affect technology development and product quality, are among them. To remedy the current situation and make RD contribute to economic development, new technology organizations, Engineering Research Centers, need to be established to bridge RD units and production units. In addition, strengthening intellectual property right protection and formulating RD promotion measures are needed as well as strengthening metrology and calibration capability.

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The balance among three main guiding disciplines was known to be the primary concern for the management of an industrial corporation, where each discipline provides for sales, for profit and for technology, respectively. From such a viewpoint, the general trends in technological strategies performed by Japanese corporations are reviewed, and it is found therefrom that the management style began to change from the sales-oriented (and/or the hyper-sales-oriented) to the technology-oriented (and/or the hyper-technology-oriented) style during the period while the Japanese economy losing rapidly its high growth rates. It is also pointed out in this period that the technologies for high efficiencies in production was first appreciated, but later on the R&D activities to develop advanced technologies were much appreciated. Changes in managerial indices under the management styles of bot sales-oriented and technology-oriented are estimated by using the JSR-RDM Model previously descrided.

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Product development (PD) needs to consider such characteristics as multigoals and qualitative evaluation, cost constraint and combinatorial structure of development alternatives. The term cost-performance used so far has been mainly emphasizing ex post facto the improvement in single function with respect to cost. The use of cost-performance curve (CPC), including multiple and qualitative criteria and under varied cost constraints, will be effective for better PD decision making.This paper constructs a model for selecting a combinatorial alternative (CA) in PD so as to maximize total performance under cost constraint by using Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Dynamic Programming (DP). The characteristics of this model lie in the points that the concept of CPC using the extended performance is newly introduced and the joint use of AHP and DP is originally attempted to treat with the problem. The results of analyses show that the monotonic property of CPC is effective in optimally selecting a CA. An application to CD vending machines is presented. The method treating with dependent CAs is also shown.

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