How the “Space Race” splintered into “Space Races”, and why they are inseparable from international politics.
Amidst escalating contemporary global tensions increasingly compared to the Cold War, new space contests are emerging. The original ‘Space Race’ between the opposing sides of the Iron Curtain has given way to a captivating array of races, each unfolding on a different trajectory. Today’s races – plural intended – extend beyond superpower showdowns, encompassing a captivating cast of actors, both public and private, old and new. Fueled by cutting-edge technology and varied goals, these modern space races reveal celestial battlegrounds that starkly contrast the linear cosmic rivalry of the Cold War era.
From Competition to Collaboration
After the era of the original Space Race, a remarkable shift occurred in the landscape of space exploration. The 1975 Soyuz-Apollo mission paved the way for U.S. Soviet space collaboration. In the same year, struggling European space actors partnered to form the European Space Agency (ESA), giving medium space powers a seat at the table. France, Japan, and China developed launch vehicles of their own, and the practice of carrying other countries’ payloads to orbit became more widespread.
Investing billions and decades into developing launchers, spaceports, and engineering expertise was no longer a prerequisite to benefit from satellite technology. As a direct consequence, new and smaller actors began gaining access to space. The Netherlands and Spain sent their first satellites in the mid-1970s on US launchers. Indian, Czechoslovakian, and Bulgarian satellites hitched rides on Soviet rockets. France carried Saudi, Brazilian, and Swedish satellites, while China’s Long March rockets opened the doors of space to Hong Kong and Pakistan.
In fact, the more ambitious the project, the wider the collaboration. When the joint U.S. and Soviet Shuttle-Mir project upscaled to the International Space Station, agencies from Europe, Japan, and Canada pitched in. NASA and ESA have entertained an ongoing two-decade partnership for a joint mission to bring samples of Mars to Earth. The Artemis Accords, underpinning the aim to resume manned spaceflights to the Moon, are continuously growing. Leveraging cost sharing and the economics of comparative advantages, groundbreaking projects increasingly rely on interstate cooperation.
Decreasing Costs Empower New Actors
Alongside collaboration, technological innovation has driven significant transformations in space exploration. Advancements in propulsion technology and reusability have decreased the cost of placing payload into Low Earth Orbit (LEO). Placing a kilogram of payload into LEO with a Scout or Delta rocket in the 1960s costed six figures. Later launch systems brought the cost down to the mid-5 figures. The newest Russian (Angara) and Chinese (Long March) models can drop a satellite at LEO for a few thousand dollars per kilogram. SpaceX’s reusable Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy achieve that feat for $2600 and $1500 respectively. Simultaneously, satellites have grown smaller and lighter, hence cheaper. Satellite costs collapsed from hundreds of millions of dollars to less than a single million, as nanosatellites – spacecraft a human being could easily carry – have swarmed the market.
As a result, sidelined actors such as small states and non-state actors joined the new space races. In December of 2022, Zimbabwe and Uganda deployed their first satellites, with NASA and JAXA’s help. In 2020, Slovenia became a satellite-operating nation with the University of Maribor’s TRISAT, while tiny Monaco claimed its place in space with its OSM-1 CICERO nanosatellite. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 delivered Kuwait’s first satellite – also a nanosatellite – in 2021.
New Actors pursue new goals
With the multiplication of actors came the multiplication of goals. Satellites alone can serve a variety of purposes: communication, transport facilitation, weather observation, intelligence gathering, and more. Instead of a linear path of milestones, contemporary space races feature crossroads and decisions. Manned vs unmanned, colonies on Mars or balloons on Venus, probes to the under ice oceans of Enceladus or the hydrocarbon lakes of Titan – the abundance of options coupled with a scarcity of means will force actors to devise space doctrines and formulate clear aims. Some actors may seek to become space powers while staying firmly on the ground, by providing spacecraft and satellite manufacturing, ground control services, or other space-related activities.
The most impactful new actors in the 21st Century’s space scene may very well be private companies. Public-private partnerships have grown ubiquitous across all functions, from Qualcomm’s role in developing chips for Ingenuity Mars helicopter to Hanwha’s stake in South Korea’s Nuri rocket. SpaceX’s role in lowering launch costs and NASA’s selection of Blue Origin’s “Blue Moon” lunar lander illustrate how private companies have invested every niche of the modern space scene, including resource and investment intensive operations. Other private initiatives are tackling the environmental impact of the new space races: Scotland-based Orbex and Skyrora are testing carbon-neutral rockets powered with biofuel, while Japan’s Astroscale promises a solution to declutter the debris accumulating on Earth’s orbit.
Opportunities Are At an all-time high
These companies are evolving on an opportunity-laden market. Advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) will likely entail key applications, such as navigation, data processing, and some ground control tasks. 3D printing could further slash manufacturing costs. Technological advancements in any field are likely to affect the space industry’s growth, as launch costs continue to steadily diminish. In 2008, NASA predicted that launch costs would reach hundreds of dollars per pound by the early 2030’s: the Falcon Heavy met this aim with a decade to spare. The same report predicted that launch costs would reach tens of dollars per pound by 2050, further enhancing access to space.
According to a McKinsey report from early 2023, the size of the global space market could more than double, from its current $447 billion to $1 trillion by 2030, while the number of satellites in orbit is predicted to triple. A Bank of America report returned similar findings, highlighting that the space sector weighed $288 billion in 2011. From enhanced communication to asteroid mining and advanced energy, space could be the key to some of humanity’s most pressing issues.
International relations play a critical role in this growth, as new space blocks and alliances are being shaped. In January of this year, the African Union established the African Space Agency (AFSA), indicating that space has already begun being a topic of discussion within a continent combining resource abundance with a high demographic potential. In late May 2023 in Hiroshima, leaders of the Quad (U.S., Australia, India, and Japan) agreed to extend the scope of their cooperation from regional security in the Indo-Pacific to space cooperation by founding a “Quad Space Working Group”. At the time of writing, media outlets in several ASEAN countries are contending that the block needs a space program of its own.
Why Astrodiplomacy matters
Whereas the number of satellites is set to triple by the close of the decade, the space around Earth is finite, forcing states and companies to apply international governance principles to collectively manage a finite commons. Space exploration, whether public or private, is intertwined with politics and diplomacy, as geopolitical uncertainties on earth can affect space initiatives.
Other risks also challenge the science-fiction dream of space prosperity, from budgetary struggles to energy shortages. The industry’s environmental impact must also be scrutinized: excessive carbon emissions and orbital debris could, if left uncontrolled, lock humanity down on earth regardless of the state of advancement of rocket or spacecraft technology.
There are at least three good reasons to monitor the politics and diplomacy of space – i.e, astrodiplomacy. First, the sector promises high rewards as it enters a period of exponential growth. Second, the clearing of technological hurdles reveals that many future challenges to space exploration will be political and organizational. Space is still heavily tied to national security and political concerns, making international relations a relevant tool for analyzing the space scene. Third, cooperation, whether among states or between the private and public sectors, is increasingly essential to achieve breakthroughs. To follow Astrodiplomacy is to have a headstart on those dynamics.
For the public, companies, and policymakers to better comprehend and navigate these risks, Astrodiplomacy will publish regular analytical pieces on space policy, space diplomacy, and the political strings attached to space-related subjects. Sign up to our mailing list, follow us on social media, and share our articles (starting with this one!) to spread the word!