: Kuhlmann, S.

Abstract
In association with the increasing significance and differentiation of technology policy: the research into the direct and indirect effects and the attempts at a systematic evaluation of government technology policy programmes have gaining in importance in Germany. The functions of such scientifically based evaluations are manifold: they extend from the legitimation of such programmes by the proof of adequate and efficient utilisation of public funds; they extend of technocratic "controlling" in the sense of improved management and "fine tuning" (as it is called in technical jargon) of technology policies, accomanied by the idea of a far-reaching manageability of economic innovative processes; they extend to the attempt to create transparency in the existing confusion of subsidies and different models of "technology promotion". Creation of transparency means the attempt to expose the (often contradictory) rationalities of technology policies, in order to make them open to criticism an d learning processes. This would be an orientation of policy towards one of the possible "models for the 21st century": the farsighted estimation of indirect and undesired effects and interactions of technology policy measures in ecological, economic, and social respects.