How to achieve benefit from mission-oriented research: lessons from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Naval Research Laboratory

Does the research performed by government mission agencies contribute to improved decision-making? Climate research within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has the stated goal of providing "optimal benefit" to decision makers on all levels, and the meteorology division of Department of Defense's Naval Research Laboratory promises research directed towards application. Assuming that research can lead to benefit for decision makers with minimal guidance can lead to irrelevance, wasted effort, and missed opportunities. Moving beyond the assumption leads to critical consideration of processes creating climate and meteorological science. I report the results of contextual mapping, of research on decision processes, and of interviews with agency scientists and users of science to evaluate their science regimes. In the case of the USDA scientists do target stakeholders through formal and informal mechanisms, but much of the science does not find use due to institutional constraints, political considerations, and disciplinary inertia. The research results will provide options for closing these policy gaps, such as higher-level stakeholder interaction and better representation of diverse interests. I apply the economic concept of supply and demand to describe where supply of science provides decision support that matches user demand, and where science policies might miss opportunities or mischaracterize research as useful to a specific user. This analysis leads to increased understanding of how factors such as the definition of scientific problems, hierarchies in science decision-making structures, quality control mechanisms beyond peer review, distribution of participants in the knowledge production enterprise, and social accountability guide the process of producing useful information.