AbstractThe first symposium of the North American and Caribbean Branch of the International Science Policy Foundation (ISPF) was held in September 1988 at Kingston, Ontario. Free trade negotiations had just been pursued by Canada and the United States and federal trade legislation had recently been passed in the US. The 80 delegates concluded that science policy issues had a low profile in free or ‘freer’ trade and that, in the Canada-US case, it would be some time before science and technology policies would be significantly affected. Nevertheless, the delegates did suggest that a research agenda could be put together.