Science History Institute Oral History Collections
Science History Institute, "Oral History of the Toxic Substances Control Act: Science History Institute", contributed by Prerna Srigyan, STS Infrastructures, Platform for Experimental Collaborative Ethnography, last modified 27 January 2024, accessed 4 November 2024. https://stsinfrastructures.org/content/oral-history-toxic-substances-control-act-science-history-institute
Critical Commentary
This collection contains fourteen oral history interviews with individuals invovled in writing, processing and negotiating the Toxic Substances Control Act. These individuals have diverse career pathways, such as a nuclear engineer who started working as a science officer in Moscow in 1960s, and an administrative assistant in the United States Congress who ended up as the Chief Sustainability Officer of DuPont in 2004.
What were their motivations to work on the Act? How did they contribute their expertise? What did they learn while on the job and how? What did they do with what they learned? How do they imagine the legacy and vision of TOSCA going forward?
Analysis of these interviews can provide useful insight on behind-the-scenes scientific, administrative, and legal workings of TOSCA. Broadly, it can help in understanding the relationship between a government agencies and the industries they (attempt to) regulate during postwar America.