Some have criticized the Vision for Space Exploration as having been crafted behind closed doors, without input and guidance from the public, academia, and international partners.

Europe, on the other hand, is taking a very different -- and characteristically European -- approach in the formulation of a new collective space policy:

The European space council is set to meet in Brussels for the first time on Thursday this week. Ministers who sit on the EU's competitiveness council will attend the meeting along with ministerial officials from the European Space Agency (ESA).

The meeting is being touted as the first step towards a co-ordinated European space policy, and the announcement from ESA gives an insight into just how much bureaucratic wrangling goes into a project this size.

In brief: the Space Council sessions were first proposed in a Framework Agreement, which was adopted in 2003, and came into force in May this year. This agreement sets out how the EU will develop a coordinated, pan-European space policy. An outline of how the policy might look already exists - it is the result of three years of effort between ESA and the EU, defining objectives and identifying priorities. The final document is expected to be approved at a space council session towards the end of 2005.

The ESA says that an exchange of views will be at the core of the agenda, along with the almost inevitable progress report. The outcome of the meeting will be made public late on Thursday evening.

I can hardly wait for the European space policy counterpart to the VSE to be published...it will be the culmination of a grand generational undertaking, not unlike the return to the Moon itself.

Posted by T.L. James on November 22, 2004 09:44 PM