The European Research Conundrum: when research organizations impede scientific and technological breakthroughs despite targets, money and policy to foster these activities
Armbruster, Chris
Chris.Armbruster at EUI.EU
Thu Oct 29 10:43:47 EDT 2009
Dear David,
It would be nice if you looked at the literature. Case studies and interviews may not be the kind of methods you favour, but there are notable scholars (not me) who have looked at decades of evidence, conducted detailed case studies of organizations and interviewed hundreds of scientists that have achieved recognized breakthroughs.
Best, Chris
-----Original Message-----
From: ASIS&T Special Interest Group on Metrics on behalf of David E. Wojick
Sent: Thu 10/29/2009 16:23
To: SIGMETRICS at LISTSERV.UTK.EDU
Subject: Re: [SIGMETRICS] The European Research Conundrum: when research organizations impede scientific and technological breakthroughs despite targets, money and policy to foster these activities
Dear Chris,
Bear in mind that this list is populated by people who study science
scientifically. You appear to be making strong empirical claims based
on anecdotal evidence. I seriously doubt that there is a strong
statistical correlation between breakthroughs and forms of
organization, but I would be willing to look at the scientific
studies, if there are any. The same is true for "conducive working
environments," whatever that means. In the case you describe the
determining factor is probably money, not the form of organization.
The best schools bid for the best people and produce the best work
(but not necessarily breakthroughs). Organization is not a factor.
My best,
David
Dear David,
no claim is made that we can causally explain or quantify
breakthroughs. Yet, it is possible to describe with a good degree of
accuracy what organizations look like that have been - repeatedly! -
the site of a recognized breakthrough. Also, we can describe what
places look like that impede or discourage such efforts.
Rather than thinking about this in terms of revolutions and normal
science, what about a very pragmatic approach that revolves, for
example, around advising junior scientists where to go? My bet would
be that in 'fostering organisations' the job satisfaction of
researchers will be much higher than in the miserable places (e.g.
compare Rockefeller University to any underfunded university in
Europe). Why? Even though we cannot quantify breakthroughs very well
and most researchers do not receive the Nobel Prize, we all do have a
pretty clear idea about what a conducive working environment is in
which you can meaningfully contribute to the progress of science...
One way to go about building more and better knowledge is to describe
and analyse the sites at which recognized breakthroughs occur,
although this will always have to be historical. Another is to track
the experience of those recently awarded flagship grants, and
contribute towards removing the organizational obstacles... This is
not rocket science, but possibly rather close to what business and
management schools do and what is known as organizational
restructuring. Yet, I think it would be more than worthwhile.
Best, Chris
-----Original Message-----
From: ASIS&T Special Interest Group on Metrics on behalf of David Wojick
Sent: Thu 10/29/2009 13:02
To: SIGMETRICS at LISTSERV.UTK.EDU
Subject: Re: [SIGMETRICS] The European Research Conundrum: when
research organizations impede scientific and technological
breakthroughs despite targets, money and policy to foster these
activities
y/sigmetrics.html
Dear Chris,
I am skeptical of your claim that "it is known what kind of
organizational design is conducive to scientific and technological
breakthroughs and that this knowledge could be utilized to drive
forward organizational restructuring." (But I have not seen your
paper.)
First, I am not aware of any empirical model of breakthroughs that is
sufficiently well developed to support such a precise claim. It would
require being able to identify and quantify breakthroughs, and I
don't think we can do that (yet). How many breakthroughs were there
last year? One, ten, ten thousand, a million? I don't think we know,
because the concept is still wildly imprecise.
Second, following Kuhn, I would argue that producing breakthroughs is
not the job of most scientists, so science should not be organized
around this goal. That is, each breakthrough depends upon a great
deal of prior work, which must first be funded. In fact I think that
this purported "breakthrough race" is based on a mistaken concept of
how science works. One can't fund just the breakthroughs. Would that
we could, but science does not work that way.
Still it is a wonderful question, which I too am working on. See for example:
<http://www.osti.gov/ostiblog/home/entry/leaping_concepts_and_global_discovery>http://www.osti.gov/ostiblog/home/entry/leaping_concepts_and_global_discovery
Cheers,
David
David Wojick, Ph.D.
Senior consultant for innovation
Office of Scientific and Technical Information
US Dept. of Energy
Oct 29, 2009 06:50:56 AM, SIGMETRICS at LISTSERV.UTK.EDU wrote:
===========================================
[SIGMETRICS] The European Research Conundrum: when research
organizations impede scientific and technological breakthroughs
despite targets, money and policy to foster these activities
Dear Loet,
One could indeed infer that the ERC organizes the power of the
European scientific elite - only that the ERC review (by members of
that very same elite) heavily criticized the lack of transparency
that comes with it, e.g. in the selection of peer reviewers.
The ERC is also a signal that, at the European level, research is now
an important issue (even as innovation remains the main focus). And
yes, there is a struggle over how large the FP8 budget will be, what
'joint programming' etc. means. Yet, the ERC is part of 'The New
Renaissance Dream' whereby Europe seeks to foster scientific and
technological breakthroughs. Also, in the past decade the Commission
has intervened on the question of university and research
organizations and, at least nominally, these organizations have
responded by organizing themselves (e.g. EUA, EUROHORCS, EIROfroum)
and by espousing a call for restructuring in pursuit or excellence,
i.e. new breakthroughs. Also, at the national level this is an
issue, e.g. German Excellence Initiative.
The paper addresses these broad issues and suggests that Europe and
the national governments, but above all the research organizations
and universities must concentrate on organization restructuring (not
targets, money & policy). Minimally they must do this to avoid being
left behind by North America, East Asia and India. But also in terms
of the articulated European Research Dream - which is shared by many
leading scholars (c.f. those organising the ERC or Euroscience or
those advising the EC) - the organizational restructuring for more
autonomy, more scientific leadership, more mission-oriented
flexibility, more intellectual diversity etc. should be the
imperative governing their actions.
Armbruster, Chris, The European Research Conundrum: When Research
Organizations Impede Scientific and Technological Breakthroughs
Despite Targets, Money and Policy to Foster these Activities.
(October 27, 2009). Available at SSRN:
<http://ssrn.com/abstract=1494534>http://ssrn.com/abstract=1494534
Best, Chris
-----Original Message-----
From: ASIS&T Special Interest Group on Metrics on behalf of Loet Leydesdorff
Sent: Thu 10/29/2009 08:22
To: SIGMETRICS at listserv.utk.edu
Subject: Re: [SIGMETRICS] The European Research Conundrum: when
research organizations impede scientific and technological
breakthroughs despite targets, money and policy to foster these
activities
y/sigmetrics.html
Dear Chris,
The situation is very interesting. National research councils
traditionally organize the power of the scientific elite (Mills,
Mulkay) and given the subsidiarity principle this power cannot be
taken away easily by a European organization. The EU therefore in the
1980s decided to focus not on science, but on innovation (Jaques
Delors). The Framework Programmes were defined in terms of the
precompetitive technosciences. This terrain was yet unoccupied by
national research councils.
With the shift of attention to science as central to the
knowledge-base of an economy (e.g., the US program SciSIP, but mainly
China), this arrangement may have to be revised (for economic
reasons). Thus, we are witnessing in my opinion a power struggle
rather than a conundrum. At issue is who controls the allocation of
research funds and to which extend: national research councils or the
EU?
Best wishes,
Loet
On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 9:24 PM, Armbruster, Chris
wrote:
> Adminstrative info for SIGMETRICS (for example unsubscribe):
>
><http://web.utk.edu/~gwhitney/sigmetrics.html>http://web.utk.edu/~gwhitney/sigmetrics.html
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> Please find the abstract and the link to a new working paper on the European
> Research Conundrum. Comments are welcome. I would be interested to hear from
> colleagues interested in this issue.
>
> Armbruster, Chris, The European Research Conundrum: when research
> organizations impede scientific and technological breakthroughs despite
> targets, money and policy to foster these activities. (October 27, 2009).
>
> Available at SSRN:
><http://ssrn.com/abstract=1494534>http://ssrn.com/abstract=1494534
>
> Abstract
> The European Research Conundrum may be described thus: In the interest of
> the European Research Dream, the structure and culture of the research
> organization should be adapted to the mission of achieving scientific and
> technological breakthroughs but, alas, this mission is first overwhelmed and
> then deformed by the existing structure and culture of the organization. The
> conundrum has been highlighted publicly by the high-level review of the
> European Research Council (ERC), which "found fundamental problems related
> to rules and practices regarding the governance, administration and
> operations of the ERC that are not adapted to the nature of modern
> 'frontier' science management." The organization threatens to defeat the
> mission, even though the ERC is new, corresponds to targets, and is well
> funded.
> This paper advances three arguments. Firstly, the prevalent focus on
> targets, money and policy is criticized because it does little to bring
> about the required organizational restructuring while allowing the
> organization to overwhelm the mission, thus threatening a lock-in of ERA as
> second rate. Secondly, it is shown that it is known what kind of
> organizational design is conducive to scientific and technological
> breakthroughs and that this knowledge could be utilized to drive forward
> organizational restructuring. Thirdly, some practical suggestions are made
> how to gather empirical evidence about barriers and challenges in the
> European Research Area by tracking the experience of grantees of European
> flagship programmes in a multiple case-study design, which may be extended
> to innovation systems.
> To also speak to those who think that targets, money and policy should
> remain the focus, the research may be designed in a fashion that
> accommodates alternative and competing hypotheses as to what is conducive to
> or impedes scientific and technological breakthroughs and innovations
> systems.
>
> Keywords
> Scientific breakthroughs, technological inventions, innovation systems,
> European Research Area, European Research Council, scientific excellence,
> research university, research funding, research policy, R&D targets
>
>
> Chris Armbruster
> Executive Director, Research Network 1989
>
><http://www.cee-socialscience.net/1989/>http://www.cee-socialscience.net/1989/
>
> Publications and working papers available in Open Access
> <http://ssrn.com/author=434782>http://ssrn.com/author=434782
>
>
--
Loet Leydesdorff
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681
loet at leydesdorff.net ; <http://www.leydesdorff.net/>http://www.leydesdorff.net/
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