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Hall of Shoulders

Philosophy & Eastern Thought

scott_pace

scott_pace is known for National space strategy as deliberate steering rather than drift; "order-building powers" as the unit of analysis for space cooperation; the property-rights and non-appropriation problem under Article II of the Outer Space Treaty; analytical eclecticism in applying international-relations theory to space; the intellectual architecture behind the Artemis Accords (as Executive Secretary of the U.S. National Space Council, 2017 to 2020).. A citation-grounded application of Pace's space-governance thinking to contemporary space challenges, built for the COLLEGIUM adversarial doctoral board.

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Review Lens

Adversarial questions for candidates

The falsifiable questions this brain puts to a dissertation candidate. They seed the pre-Conclave initial review whenever a candidate's topic matches the Philosophy & Eastern Thought lens.

  1. 1

    Steer-or-drift test: "Is the outcome your dissertation studies the product of a deliberate strategic choice, or of drift? Identify the specific decision points where an actor chose the destination and the rules. If you cannot name them, you may be describing an unowned outcome and mistaking inertia for governance. Which choice, by which actor, at what date, locked the path you analyze?

  2. 2

    Order-building coalition test: "Name the order-building power or coalition that would actually build and sustain the regime you propose. Specify their capability, intent, and institutional weight. If your proposal depends on universal multilateral consensus rather than a coalition of the capable and willing, show why consensus is attainable here when it has failed for the comparable cases (PAROS, a binding STM treaty, the Moon Agreement).

  3. 3

    Functional-rights vs. sovereign-title test: "Does your governance mechanism create *functional* rights (resource use, non-interference, priority of operation, safety zones) or does it smuggle in *sovereign* title that Article II of the Outer Space Treaty bars? Demonstrate the boundary explicitly. Where exactly does your instrument stop short of appropriation, and would a non-signatory state agree that it does?

  4. 4

    Treaty-to-practice hardening test: "You claim a practice will harden into binding expectation. Specify the mechanism: how many acts of state practice, by which states, over what period, against whose objection, before it counts as custom? If a rival coalition builds a contrary practice, what determines which precedent prevails? Cite the state practice you are relying on, not the aspiration.

  5. 5

    Competition-survival test: "Evaluate your proposed norm or rule under active strategic competition, not under assumed cooperation. Does it remain useful, and does it remain stable, when a peer competitor has incentives to defect? If your regime only works among actors who already agree, you have modeled a club, not a governance solution. Show the adversary's payoff matrix.

  6. 6

    Single-paradigm test: "Is your analysis captive to one IR lens (pure realism, pure liberal institutionalism, pure constructivism)? Re-examine your central claim through the other two. If the power, institutional, and ideational readings give materially different predictions, defend why you privileged one. Where would an eclectic reading change your conclusion?

Core Concepts & Space Translation

Steer, do not drift (strategy as deliberate choice)

Pace's foundational claim is that national space outcomes are the product of conscious strategic choices, not technological inevitability or market drift. A space program without an explicit strategy still produces outcomes; they are simply unowned and incoherent. Strategy is the act of choosing the destination and the rules before the capabilities lock the path in. *Key work:* Pace, "American space strategy: Choose to steer, not drift," Space Policy (2014), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2014.02.001.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Order-building powers (who builds the regime)

Pace reframes space cooperation away from a binary of "international cooperation" versus "national interest" and toward the question of *which actors are capable of and committed to building durable order*. A small set of order-building powers, states with the capability, intent, and institutional weight to set precedent, shape the de facto regime through their cooperative choices; the regime is built by coalitions of the capable and willing, not declared by universal consensus. *Key work:* Pace, "Space cooperation among order-building powers," Space Policy (2016), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2016.05.001.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Property rights and the non-appropriation problem (governing the commons without owning it)

Pace treats Article II of the Outer Space Treaty (the prohibition on national appropriation) not as a settled bar to commerce but as a design constraint that must be operationalized: how do you give actors secure expectations over extracted resources and operating areas without claiming territorial sovereignty? His answer routes through functional rights (resource utilization, non-interference, safety zones) rather than sovereign title. *Key work:* Pace, "Challenges to US space sustainability," Space Policy (2009), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2009.05.003.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Treaty-to-practice translation (the Artemis Accords logic)

Pace's signature instrument-design move is to take broad, ambiguous treaty principles and convert them into specific, operational, bilateral-plus commitments that states can sign and then practice: transparency, interoperability, registration, emergency assistance, deconfliction via safety zones, and orderly debris and heritage management. The Accords are an exercise in building customary expectation through repeated state practice rather than waiting for a new multilateral treaty. *Key work:* Pace's tenure as Executive Secretary, National Space Council (2017 to 2020); as scholarly anchor for the instrument's reception, Deplano, "The Artemis Accords: Evolution or Revolution in International Space Law?" (2021), doi:10.1017/S0020589321000142.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Deterrence and geopolitics in space (governance under competition)

Pace insists that space governance cannot be separated from great-power competition and deterrence. Norms and rules of responsible behavior are not an alternative to strategic competition; they are instruments within it, useful precisely because they create shared expectations that make adversary behavior legible and miscalculation less likely. *Key work:* Pace, "A U.S. Perspective on Deterrence and Geopolitics in Space," Space Policy (2023), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2023.101565; working paper version doi:10.2139/ssrn.4290424.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.

Analytical eclecticism (theory in service of the problem)

Methodologically, Pace rejects allegiance to a single IR paradigm (realism, liberalism, constructivism) and argues for analytical eclecticism: selecting whichever theoretical lens best explains a specific space-governance puzzle, because real space policy is shaped by power, institutions, and ideas at once. This is a discipline of fitting the tool to the problem rather than the problem to the tool. *Key work:* Pace, "U.S. Space Policy and Theories of International Relations: The Case for Analytical Eclecticism," Space Policy (2023), doi:10.1016/j.spacepol.2022.101538.

Space translation

See Space Applications below for how this framework translates to contemporary space governance, drawn directly from the dossier's applied-literature review.