EDITORIAL INFORMATION

An engrossing read, Critical Issues in the History of Spaceflight is a volume consisting of scholarship on the current state of the discipline of space history presented in a joint NASA and NASM conference in 2005. The essays presented in the book question such issues as the motivations of spaceflight, and the necessity, if any, of manned space exploration.

(Extracted from the press release).

GENERAL TABLE OF CONTENTS

-Contents.
-Introduction.
-Section I: Motivations for spaceflight.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 1: Seeking newer Worlds: an Historical Context for
space exploration —Stephen J. Pyne.
-Chapter 2: Compelling rationales for spaceflight? History and the
search for relevance —Roger D. Launius.
-Section II: Human and robotic exploration.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 3: Observations on the robotic versus Human issue in spaceflight —Howard E. McCurdy.
-Chapter 4: Human-Machine issues in the soviet space program —Slava Gerovitch.
-Chapter 5: Human and Machine in the History of spaceflight —David A. Mindell.
-Section III: NASA and external relations.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 6: NASA and the aerospace industry: Critical issues and research prospects —Philip Scranton.
-Chapter 7: NASA and the Department of Defense: enduring themes in three key areas —Peter Hays.
-Chapter 8: Technology, foreign policy, and international Cooperation in space —John Krige.
-Section IV: Access to space.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 9: “A failure of national leadership”: Why no replacement for the space shuttle? —John M. Logsdon.
-Chapter 10: Reusable launch vehicles or expendable launch vehicles? A perennial Debate —Andrew J. Butrica.
-Section V: NASA Cultures.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 11: Changing NASA: the Challenges of organizational system failures —Diane Vaughan.
-Chapter 12: Accidents, engineering, and History at nasa, 1967–2003
—Alexander Brown.
-Chapter 13: Institutional issues for Continued space exploration: High-reliability systems across Many operational generations—requisites for public credibility —Todd R. la Porte.
-Section VI: Space History: State of the art.
-Introduction.
-Chapter 14: American space History: legacies, Questions, and opportunities for future research —Asif A. Siddiqi.
-Chapter 15: The History and Historiography of national security space
—Stephen B. Johnson.
-Chapter 16: Critical theory as a toolbox: suggestions for space History’s
relationship to the History subdisciplines —Margaret A. Weitekamp.
-Chapter 17: Space artifacts: are they Historical evidence? —David A. Devorkin.
-Section VII: Postscript.
-Afterword: Community and explanation in space History (?) —Martin Collins.
-About the authors.
-Acronyms and abbreviations.
-The NASA History series.
-Index.