Engineering world society? Scientists, internationalism, and the advent of the Space Age

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the English School concept of world society and how it helps to illustrate the role of non-state actors and the promotion of cosmopolitan values. Yet, less attention has been paid to the idea of science and technology as a key feature of solidarist conceptions of justice and as a unifier of humankind, usually expressed in the form of scientific internationalism. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, it suggests that it is important to incorporate the role of scientists and engineers as agents of international society and to assess the significance of scientific internationalism in terms of its impact on facilitating world society. Second, however, it is also necessary to consider how this solidarist conception of science and technology is staged as complementary to a pluralist logic. This is because of the political and social embeddedness of scientists and engineers as actors who also think and act on behalf of the state. I develop this argument by examining two key turning points that paved the way towards the advent of the Space Age: the spaceflight movement of the 1920s and 1930s and the 1957–1958 International Geophysical Year.