This panel presents new research on the emergence of Asia-Pacific as a region of international scientific cooperation after World War II. Since the 18^th century, the Pacific and tropical Asia have been sites of scientific study, attracting naturalists and explorers who have turned knowledge of Asia-Pacific into European scientific knowledge. This historiography is well developed, as is the history of the subsequent institutionalization of colonial science within the European empires of tropical Asia. Yet historians have ignored Asia-Pacific science in the second half of the 20^th century, at a time when imperial scientific networks were replaced by international and global ones. Now new research is showing how the Pacific War reset the scientific networks of Asia-Pacific science, where in the context of decolonization, multi-lateral collaboration, and the Cold War, an international Asia-Pacific science took shape. The collapse of the Japanese Empire, the Chinese Civil War, and the decolonization of Southeast Asian nations brought new political and scientific leaders into power across the region. They sought to craft scientific policies which promoted national, and especially economic, development, while also leveraging scientific achievement for international legitimacy. At the same time, decolonization opened up new possibilities for international collaboration, as science was no longer constrained by the imperial circuits of the pre-war Asia-Pacific region. Younger scientists had choices in advanced training, European and North American scientists found new research sites, and national science cultures developed efforts to showcase their efforts internationally.

In the post-war period, the internationalist framework created a new emphasis on international collaboration and exchange, and was a period for efforts to scientifically integrate scientific communities, stretching across older imperial boundaries. In Asia-Pacific this led to a reorientation of scientific networks, creating new institutions and practices based upon national independence and sovereignty, leading to partnerships that brought North American and Asian scientists together in collaborative relationships. While this did not immediately erode the older imperial networks, it did lead US scientists and policymakers to seek ways to structure Asia-Pacific networks within a Cold War framework. While this collaboration has been studied by historians, anthropologists, and political scientists in the context of the creation of Area Studies, the concurrent development of Asia-Pacific as a region for natural science has been largely ignored.

Our three papers present new research about the making of Asia-Pacific science during and after the Pacific War. Our first paper shows how a US military initiative originally about migratory birds led to new network of ornithologists in Cold War Asia, encompassing Japan, South Korea, and Japan. This offers a new way of understanding the emergence of scientific environmentalism in the Asia-Pacific region. Our second paper shows how military requirements shaped the development of meteorological and climate research in colonial Malaya in the middle of the 20^th century. And our final paper examines the creation of Southeast Asia as a network and area for environmental research, through an analysis of the post-war Pacific Science Congresses held in Southeast Asia.