OCCASIONAL PAPER No. - UNESDOC Databaseunesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001831/183180e.pdf · The...

16 Selected papers on

sharing research agendas on knowledge systems

Edited by Heather EgginsVisiting Professor, Institute for Education Policy Research (IEPR)

Senior Member, Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge

Member, Governing Council of the University of Northampton

ED-2009/WS/33

United NationsEducational, Scientific and

Cultural Organization

UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge

OCCASIONAL PAPER No.

Division of Higher Education • U N E S C O F o r u m o n H i g h e r E d u c a t i o n , R e s e a r c h a n d K n o w l e d g e

w w w . u n e s c o . o r g / e d u c a t i o n / r e s e a r c h f o r u m

OCCASIONAL PAPER No. 16 Selected papers on

sharing research agendas on knowledge systems

Edited by Heather EgginsVisiting Professor, Institute for Education Policy Research (IEPR)

Senior Member, Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge

Member, Governing Council of the University of Northampton

United NationsEducational, Scientific and

Cultural Organization

UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge

Division of Higher Education • U N E S C O F o r u m o n H i g h e r E d u c a t i o n , R e s e a r c h a n d K n o w l e d g e

w w w . u n e s c o . o r g / e d u c a t i o n / r e s e a r c h f o r u m

ED-2009/WS/��

The authors are responsible for the choice and the presentation of the facts contained in this document and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of UNESCO and do not commit the Organization.

The designation employed and the presentation of material throughout this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of UNESCO concerning the legal status of any country, city or area of it authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

Published by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 7, place de Fontenoy 75352 Paris 07 SP

Layout Design: Sabine Lebeau Technical Editing: Pauline Harvey

Issues addressed by:Neo Molotja; Mammo Muchie; Claes Brundenius;Bengt-Åake Lundvall; Judith Sutz;Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona; María Cristina Parra-Sandoval;Alicia Inciarte González; Amalia Bohórquez;David Cooper; Nduduzo Phuthi; Paul D. M. Gundani;Isaiah M. Sibanda; Stephen Matope; Champakh T. Parekh;Koen Jonkers; Labib Arafeh; Winston Dookeran; Irena Kuzmanoska; Tereso Tullao; John Paolo Rivera.

© UNESCO 2009

• I

CONTENTS

Foreword IVUNESCOForumonHigherEducation,ResearchandKnowledgeHeather Eggins, Editor; Mary-Louise Kearney, Director

PartI. Methodologiesforthestudyofknowledgesystems 1

Chapter 1 2MeasuringScienceandTechnologyIndicatorsinSouthAfrica:RoleoftheCentreforScience,TechnologyandInnovationIndicatorsNeo Molotja

PartII. Casestudiesonknowledgesystems: 15highereducationanduniversities

Chapter 2 16BuildingresearchuniversitiesinAfrica:thechallengesMammo Muchie

Chapter 3 26Towardsinclusivesystemsofinnovationanddevelopmentaluniversitysystems:normative,empiricalandpolicyperspectivesClaes Brundenius; Bengt-Aake Lundvall; Judith Sutz

Chapter 4 38Innovativepublicpolicytolinksciencewithdevelopment:BolivarianuniversityofVenezuela(BUV)Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona; María Cristina Parra-Sandoval;Alicia Inciarte; Amalia Bohórquez

Chapter 5 54Universitiesinnationaldevelopment:perspectivesonasecond academicrevolutionlinkedtoathirdindustrialrevolutionDavid Cooper

Chapter 6 66Needs-basedknowledgeprocessingthroughuniversity-communitypartnerships:highereducationinroadsintoruralcommunitydevelopmentinZimbabweNduduzo Phuthi; Paul D. M. Gundani;Isaiah M. Sibanda; Stephen Matope; Champakh T. Parekh

II • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

PartIII. Casestudiesonknowledgesystems:mapping, 78analyzingandmeasuringresearchcapacities andhumanresources

Chapter 7 79Scientificmobilityandinternationalresearchcollaboration: caseofChinaKoen Jonkers

Chapter 8 88AnalyticalandcomparativestudyofthePalestinianresearch knowledgenationalsystemLabib Arafeh

PartIV. Dimensionsofknowledgesystems:policies, 95governance,infrastructure,humanresources, researchoutput,cooperationagreements, tensionsanddynamics

Chapter 9 97Buildingaknowledgeeconomy:issuesonfinancinghigher educationWinston Dookeran

Chapter 10 110Rethinkinggovernance–trends,policies,policyoptionsIrena Kuzmanoska; Zoran Popovski

Chapter 11 122Impactoftemporarylabourmigrationonthedemandforeducation:implicationsforhumanresourcedevelopmentinthePhilippinesTereso Tullao; John Paolo Rivera

Contents

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FOREWORD

The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Knowledge and Research is pleased to publish this Occasional Paper which develops certain research summaries presented at the Global Research Seminar held in Paris, 28 to 29 November 2008, on the theme of Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems. This Seminar gathered together some 100 researchers from over 50 Member States as well as experts from UNESCO’s IGO and NGO partner organizations such as OECD, WHO, FAO and NEPAD, which carry out work in this important area.

First and foremost, it is appropriate to situate this publication in relation to the aims of UNESCO Forum and, thus, to contextualize current issues related to systems of higher education, research and innovation research (known as HERI). The UNESCO Forum focuses on the role and status of research systems (whether national, regional or global) and international trends in this domain in relation to the challenges posed by the Knowledge Society of the twenty-first century. Located at UNESCO and supported by the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida), the UNESCO Forum provides a platform for researchers, policy-makers and relevant stakeholders to engage critically with the key elements underpinning research systems: (i) policy trend; (ii) infrastructure; (ii) human capacity; and (iv) investment. This project has assured follow-up action for two major UNESCO conferences, the 1998 World Conference on Higher Education, “Higher Education in the twenty-first century” and the 1999 World Conference on Science, “Science for the twenty-first century”, and links closely to the intergovernmental programme for the Management of Social Transformation (MOST), located in the Sector of Social and Human Sciences (SHS), UNESCO.

Since 2001, the UNESCO Forum has consolidated its efforts to bridge research and policy in a number of ways through facilitating and broadening the space for critical debate and through revisiting the established and dominant views so as to reconceptualize future directions. To date, its various components for attaining these goals: (i) mobilizing experts; (ii) stimulating global and regional debate; (iii) producing and disseminating research; (iv) promoting strategic partnerships; (v) facilitating communication, and (vi) strengthening the systemic approach have yielded creditable results. The UNESCO Forum believes that it is central to reaffirm the importance of research at the current moment given the rapid developments since 2000 in knowledge production and management and their ramifications for social change and progress. Research on research has become, therefore, even more crucial and is now well recognized as a major field of enquiry for international organizations, charged with advising their Member States about the questions involved. In this regard, the World Bank, the OECD and other important stakeholders are key partners of the UNESCO Forum.

The UNESCO Forum pursues a systemic approach to the analysis of research so as to address strengths and weaknesses, as well as specific issues and concerns, in a critical manner. This work will embrace research in both industrialized and emerging contexts, as well as researchers whether reputed or at the start of their careers. The central objective is to promote ongoing research and to place significant results in the public

IV • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

eye. Consequently, research may be more original, innovative and effective, thus leading towards more sustainable human development.

Today, unprecedented emphasis is being placed on research as key motor for advancing the knowledge society and its offspring, the knowledge economy. Consequently, “research on the state of research” has moved high on the priority agendas for governments, for their specialized agencies and bodies devoted to this area, and for higher education institutions. Thus, mapping and analyzing their systems has become essential in order to acquire an understanding of their functioning and, therefore, future requirements.

This systemic approach necessitates the study of specific issues arising from the various areas involved. In this regard, the Global Research Seminar focused on three areas of debate:

Comparing methodologies for the study of knowledge systems.

Case studies related to higher education (notably universities), to the mapping and analysis of research systems.

Specific dimensions of knowledge systems (inter alia, policies, governance, infrastructure, human resources, research output, cooperation agreements and emerging tensions and dynamics).

This Occasional Paper provides an opportunity for a more in-depth study of certain aspects of HERI systems, thereby emphasizing the vastly different contexts and socio-economic conditions in which higher education, research and innovation systems are being constructed and the impact of these variables which may be political, social, economic and cultural in character.

The UNESCO Forum expresses its gratitude to the authors of the papers in this collection.

Heather Eggins, Editor.

Mary-Louise Kearney, Director,

Forum Secretariat, UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge

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• VThe UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge

Foreword

• V

Biography of Professor Heather Eggins

Professor Heather Eggins is currently Visiting Professor at the Institute for Education Policy Research (IEPR), Staffordshire University, UK, and a Senior Member of Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge. She is also a Member of the Governing Council of the University of Northampton, UK.

She was a Fulbright New Century Scholar in 2006, and a Visiting Scholar at Boston College, Massachusetts, USA. Previous appointments have included the Editorship of “Higher Education Quarterly” and the Directorship of an NGO of UNESCO, The Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE), London, UK.

Her research interests lie generally in the area of ‘Policy and Strategy in Higher Education’, with a particular interest in access issues, governmental policy, leadership and management, the academic profession and doctoral education. Her work as a Fulbright Scholar was concerned with the theme of Higher Education in the twenty-first century: Global Challenge and National Response. Recent publications include a chapter on “The Changing Academic Profession: Implications for the Asia-Pacific Region”, 2008, In: Competition, Collaboration and Change in the Academic Profession: Shaping Higher Education’s Contribution to Knowledge and Research, Salazar-Clemeña, R.M. and Meek, V.L. (eds.), UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge, Quezon City, the Philippines.

The research of Professor Eggins, in relation to the Fulbright Scholarship, has resulted in various conference presentations and a chapter with other authors, entitled “Comparative Perspectives on Access and Equity”, 2007. In: Higher Education in the New Century, Altbach, Ph. and McGill Peterson, P. (eds.), Sense Publishers, Rotterdam. She has a piece on Professional Doctorates appearing in a forthcoming EUA Handbook (2009), and is currently editing and contributing to a book entitled “Access and Equity: Comparative Perspectives”.

Contact details:

Professor Heather Eggins,Visiting Professor,Institute for Education Policy Research (IEPR),Staffordshire University,Brindley Building,Stoke-on-Trent ST4 2DF,United Kingdom.

e-mail: [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

PART1Methodologies for the study of

knowledge systems

Chapter 1 Measuring science and technology indicators in South Africa:

Role of the centre for science, technology and innovation indicators (CeSTII)Neo Molotja

Chapter 1Measuring science and technology indicators in South Africa: Role of the Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII)

Neo Molotja, South Africa

2 • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

1. IntroductionThe advancement of science and technology is essential for economic growth and wealth creation. The challenges facing countries are how to develop and sustain their science and technology capacity that will contribute toward economic growth. Policy-makers in general understand and acknowledge the critical role that Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) can play in positively addressing the long-term economic and social issues. Adequate investments in research and development (R&D), skilled human resources, scientific and technical infrastructure and a good education system are essential to enhance economic growth and improve the well-being of people. The formulation of policies that address economic growth and ultimately wealth creation requires that policy-makers recognize weaknesses and strengths as well as successes and failures of the economic and scientific systems in their environment. The intensification of global competitiveness which compels policy-makers to provide a balance between policies that take into account national needs and those that enable the country to be competitive also has to be considered.

The South African Government is well aware of these facts and it is also in the process, through the concerted efforts of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), other government departments and research institutions, and the overall scientific community, of developing and implementing policies that promote Science, Technology and Innovation.

Among these initiatives lies the need to measure R&D and innovation activities within the country. Indicators gleaned from measuring the scale of R&D and innovation activities are subsequently used for planning, monitoring, foresight and international benchmarking purposes. This paper outlines the role of the Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII) in assisting DST to plan its long-term strategic and operational activities by collecting R&D and Innovation data on behalf of the department. The paper will attempt to discuss the possible future role the centre could play in the provision of Science and Technology (S&T) indicators for establishing the knowledge-based economy.

1.1. National responses to challenges in growing the Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) capacity

Developed countries are in continuous dialogue on the direction that their S&T systems should take so that they can continue to be leaders in producing the best science. Their current objective is to expand what they already have, in terms of R&D and innovation

Chapter 1 Measuring science and technology indicators in South Africa: Role of the Centre for Science, Technology

and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII)

The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • �

capability, by gearing their nations’ investments towards knowledge-based economies and ultimately global competitiveness. Some countries take this objective further by setting targets for their investments in R&D, for instance the target set by the EU to increase R&D intensity to 3 per cent by 2010 (Lisbon Agenda: an economic action and development plan for the European Union (EU) set out by the European Council in Lisbon in 2000).

This may not be the case for the developing world: there are some countries that still have to quantify their levels of R&D and innovation activities. In the case of South Africa, the dialogues on the direction of the science system started before the change of Government in 1994 (IDRC, 1993). It emerged from these dialogues that the country was faced not only with the task of building a single nation but with responsibility to completely overhaul the past exclusive S&T policies that only catered for a small part of the population. The Government embarked on rigorous policy changes and developments to address the legacy of inequalities as well as campaigning for the return of foreign direct investments.

The publication of the White Paper on Science and Technology in 1996 (DACST, 1996) and the adoption of the National System of Innovation (NSI) led to several initiatives that reviewed the country’s S&T capacity: The National Research and Technology Audit (DACST 1997a), the Science, Engineering and Technology Institutions review (DACST, 1997b) and the National Research and Technology Foresight Study (DACST, 1999). These activities were coordinated and managed by the Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology (DACST) which later in 2002 split into the Department of Arts and Culture (DAC) and the Department of Science and Technology (DST).

DST continued with policy and strategy formulations and one of its most quoted documents is the National Research and Experimental Development Strategy (NRDS, DST, 2002). The strategy highlighted weaknesses and deficiencies that should be addressed for the concept of the National System of Innovation (NSI) to function. Limited expenditure on R&D by both public and private sectors, the ageing and declining human resources in S&T and fragmented governance structures in government were some of the issues identified as hampering the performance of the NSI. The solutions proposed to meet the deficiencies ranged from developing strategies to enhance innovation to transforming and training human resources in S&T and to create an effective and integrated government S&T system.

1.2. Tracking the activities and operations of the NSI

S&T indicators are used extensively by governments and other decision-makers as inputs into policy (Gordin, 2001). They provide vital statistics through which general discussions on the allocation of resources related to S&T can be based. At international level, indicators allow countries to benchmark their S&T performance and investments against one another (EU, 2005). The development of indicators has its own challenges. The selection and compilation of relevant indicators can be a daunting task, which is even more so for certain developing countries. The ever-changing nature of science, technology and innovation requires the concurrent development of new indicators to match the changes. However, help is at hand, one of the possible approaches to developing indicators is to learn from best practice.

� • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

There is a general consensus that the following factors should be considered when developing indicators:

Starting small, not all ideas can or should be developed and implemented

Collecting country-specific indicators which enable one to develop international comparability.

The development of S&T indicators should be a concerted effort, not confined to those working in S&T alone but including inputs from those working with ICT, education, and multinational enterprises. The resulting statistics could form robust and comprehensive sets of indicators.

South Africa’s re-entry into the global markets required that the country not only focus its efforts in stabilizing and growing the economy for the benefit of all but also be aware of emerging and new trends in technologies that give countries their competitive edge. A number of factors in South Africa make the task of identifying indicators to monitor progress very difficult: the dependence on resources to grow the economy, the rampant and significant ‘second’ economy, high levels of poverty and HIV/AIDS, low levels of education and the attraction of scarce skilled personnel to advanced countries. To begin to understand the impact of these issues requires the development of economic, social and S&T indicators: South Africa has begun the process of identifying and collecting these indicators.

The Department for Science and Technology (DST) coordinates the S&T indicators’ work in South Africa. In its NRDS, the department outlined a set of indicators through which the performance of the NSI could be measured – the enabling factors, which measure human resources in S&T and investment, and outcomes, which focus on inputs and linked outputs.

2. Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII)

The Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII) was established as a unit in the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC, Box 1) in 2002 by DACST. Part of its mandate is to assist the DST to achieve some of the goals outlined in the NRDS through monitoring progress of the performance of the NSI. Its other activities are concerned with achieving the HSRC’s organizational goals and objectives. The unit is funded through a ring-fenced grant within the DST’s Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF). Other running costs are provided by the HSRC through the Parliamentary Grant and further contract work performed for government and other clients.

The main role of the Centre has been to establish a baseline set of indicators through the annual R&D surveys and regular innovation surveys.

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Box 1. The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC)

The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) is a statutory body established in 1968. It is a national public entity, listed in Schedule 3A of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) 1 of 1999, as amended.

The mission of the HSRC is to provide critical information to different role players whether in policy development, media analysis, advocacy or in debate, so that they can make informed decisions. It aims to be an instrument for providing independent information, free from political, religious and/or racial bias. The HSRC generates scientific knowledge through its research and analytical work in the social and human sciences.

The HSRC has five research units, namely

Child, Youth, Family, and Social Development (CYFSD).

Democracy and Governance (D&G).

Education, Science, and Skills Development (ESSD).

Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS and Health (SAHA) and

Centre for Service Delivery (CSD).

In addition the HSRC has five further crosscutters and centers

Centre for Poverty, Employment and Growth (CPEG).

Centre for Quality Improvement (CEQI).

Knowledge Systems (KS).Geographic Information Systems (GIS).Centre for Science, Technology and Indicators (CeSTII).Socio-Economic Surveys (SES).

Policy Analysis and Capacity Enhancement (PACE).Policy Analysis Unit.Capacity Development.Gender and Development.

Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS Research Alliance (SAHARA).

The Minister of Science and Technology is the executive authority of the HSRC and is also responsible for appointing the Council. The Council receives its Parliamentary Grant through, and also reports to the Department of Science and Technology (DST). In 2008 (31 March 2008), the Council reported a turnover of ZAR264 million and received ZAR101 million through the Parliamentary grant.

During the same period the HSRC employed 483 staff members (permanent and contract posts) of which 167 were researchers.

Source: Annual Report 2007-2008, Human Sciences Research Council http///www.hsrc.ac.za

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http://www.hsrc.ac.za


3. R&D and innovation surveys in South Africa

3.1. R&D Survey

The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) conducted the South African R&D surveys between 1966 and 1989 and from 1977 onwards it did so in partnership with the HSRC. The surveys were mostly biennial (Blankley and Kahn, 2005) and were based on the first edition of the Frascati Manual (OECD, 2002). The surveys were commissioned by several departments (the Office of the Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister, the Scientific Advisory Board, and the Department of National Education) and awarded to various service providers including private ones. This led to interruptions in the survey and different approaches and methodologies being used to conduct the surveys.

With the changes in S&T policies in South Africa came along the proposal by DST to increase the R&D intensity to 1 per cent by 2008/09. This proposal required monitoring the trends in R&D expenditure and thus prompted the department to institutionalize the R&D survey.

The Knowledge Management group, later to be renamed CeSTII, was commissioned by DACST to conduct the R&D surveys on its behalf in 2002. The first of these surveys was completed during the survey year 2001/02 and since then four more surveys have been successfully completed. CeSTII is currently working on the sixth survey, which covers the 2007/08 period. The main results of the R&D survey provide the international benchmark (R&D as per cent GDP) and policy inputs.

The R&D survey reports on the following:

Intramural R&D Expenditure (Gross Expenditure on Research and Development [GERD]) by:

Sector of performance.

Sector of performance and sources of funds.

By type (Basic, Applied, and Experimental Development).

By Industry (business sector).

R&D personnel (Headcounts and FTE’s). The R&D personnel are categorized under the following:

Researchers, including postgraduate students (post-doctoral, doctoral or equivalent).

Technicians.

Other personnel directly supporting R&D.

The personnel are further classified by educational qualification, gender and race (the race question is exclusive to South Africa).

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Specific South African R&D questions. DST requested the collection of these data for its planning purposes.

Multi-disciplinary R&D:

Biotechnology.Nanotechnology.

R&D and National Priority Areas:

New materials.Open source software.HIV/AIDS, TB, Malaria.

3.2. Innovation Survey

The first innovation survey in South Africa was conducted by the Foundation for Research and Development (FRD) currently known as the National Research Foundation (NRF) and the University of Cape Town’s Industrial Strategy Project (ISP). It covered the years 1992 to 1994. The University of Pretoria (UP) in partnership with Eindhoven University conducted the second survey, which covered the years 1998 to 2000.

In 2003 CeSTII, with the backing of and funding by DST, began preparing for the first officially commissioned innovation survey (Innovation Survey 2005), which was compatible with CIS4. The results of this survey were released in 2007. The Innovation Survey 2008 (compatible with CIS5) is currently in progress and the initial results are expected in October 2009.

The innovation survey requests selected business enterprises to provide information on their sources of knowledge relevant to innovation. The data requested cover the following main topics: expenditure on activities related to product (goods or services) innovation and process innovation; sources of information relevant to innovation; sources of public funding for innovation, R&D performance and technological collaborations, effects of innovation and factors promoting or hampering innovation activities.

4. MethodologiesSouth Africa has observer status on the OECD science and technology policy committee and CeSTII senior staff regularly attend these meetings organized by the National Experts on Science and Technology Indicators (NESTI-OECD). This afforded CeSTII opportunities to be involved in the OECD/Eurostat revision of the Oslo Manual as well as the OECD/UNESCO process of developing an Annex to the Frascati Manual. Table 1 shows the differences between the Innovation survey and R&D survey as conducted by CeSTII.

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Table 1. The differences between R&D survey and innovation survey as conducted by CeSTII:

R&D surveys Innovation surveys

Based on guidelines of OECD Frascati Manual (2002) Based on guidelines of OECD/Eurostat Oslo Manual (2005) The survey follows the series of Community Innovation Surveys (CIS)

The survey aims to cover all R&D performers in all sectors.

Business enterprises & Not-For-Profit organisations. These are purposive surveys of known or likely performers of R&D

Public institutions.

Higher Education, Government departments (National and Provincial), Museums, Science Councils and Research InstitutesSurveyed as a census

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Random Sample

Sample Frame: A random stratified sample of 4000 enterprises from the Statistics South Africa business register covering the mining, manufacturing and services sectors (including wholesale and retail trade).

Sample selection: By size (four sizes of classes) and 22 business sub-sectors.

The units are weighted with lowest weights for size class 1 (the largest firms) and highest weights for size class 4 (the smallest firms). The largest firms tend to be surveyed as a census while the smaller firms are sub-sampled.

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Results comprise a census of R&D performers (Sometimes estimates are made)

Results are extrapolated to represent the business population

R&D is well understood and surveys are fairly standard

Innovation is poorly understood and surveys are still evolving

5. Major findings

5.1. R&D survey

R&D expenditure has been showing a steady growth in both nominal and real terms since 1993. Between 2005/06 and 2006/07 total R&D expenditure increased from ZAR14.149 billion to ZAR16.520 billion [Source: South African national R&D surveys]. This represents the nominal annual increase of about 16.8 per cent and an 8.7 per cent increase in real terms. According to the 2006/07 survey results, the business sector accounted for 55.9 per cent of total R&D expenditure and was the largest performer; government, combined with the science councils, accounts for 22.8 per cent of R&D expenditure; and higher education is responsible for 20.0 per cent. Not-For-Profit organizations accounted for the remaining 1.3 per cent.

GERD as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has consistently increased in recent years and is progressing positively towards reaching the R&D expenditure goal of 1 per cent GDP by survey year 2008/09.



The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • 9

The 2006/07 survey results indicate that South Africa has 1.5 FTE researchers per 1000 total in employment, the same as in 2005, although the number of FTE researchers has grown by 7.6 per cent during the year. Compared to other countries this indicator of human research potential is fairly low. This indicator needs to be monitored as the research capacity of a country significantly influences its R&D output potential.

5.2. Innovation survey

The results of the 2005 innovation survey show that South African enterprises spent a total of ZAR27.8 billion on innovation activities in 2004 (South African Innovation Survey 2005). This represents 2.4 per cent of the total turnover of all surveyed enterprises in both the industrial and services sector. About 20 per cent of expenditure on innovation was devoted to extramural R&D and a further 7.8 per cent was spent on outsourced R&D. The ZAR5.7 billion spent on R&D in 2004 accords well with the amount of ZAR5.9 billion recorded for the equivalent sectors in the 2004/05 R&D survey. The bulk of the innovation expenditure was dedicated to the acquisition of new machinery, equipment and software. Acquisition of other external knowledge accounted for about 6.5 per cent of innovation expenditure.

Approximately 52 per cent of South African enterprises had technological innovation activities, comprising both product (goods and services) and process innovations. A further 11 per cent of enterprises recorded only marketing or organisational innovations.

6. Data analysis and disseminationDespite the limitations and constraints associated with the survey work, the data collected provides very useful insights that inform many of the issues on R&D and innovation activities at the organizational, regional, national and international level. Data analysis takes place in-house and from time to time CeSTII employ the services of experts to assist with the analysis.

The data collected from the R&D survey allow for the analysis and quantification of the following:

Major contributors to R&D investments and the location of performance.

Industries (e.g. manufacturing, services in Business sector) performing R&D.

The nature of R&D expenditures (basic, applied etc.).

Sources of funds and the percentage contribution of each source.

The role of government as the performer and funder of research.

The three innovation surveys conducted in South Africa are not reliably comparable; the first two surveys were not inclusive of all the industries in the business sector. However, with the second officially commissioned Innovation survey in the field, CeSTII expects to produce more qualitative and quantitative information to build on the existing data.

The results of surveys are reported as High-Level Key Results and produced in a booklet format, followed by a more substantial report. The report is available in paper and electronic versions. R&D data are also submitted to the OECD annually for publication in

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the Main Science and Technology Indicators MSTI: Published biannually by the OECD; and by UNESCO every second year.

CeSTII provides detailed data extracts on request from the general public and this is done under the terms of an Access Protocol.

7. Challenges faced by CeSTIICeSTII faces a number of challenges presented by the work of the surveys (the nature of Innovation and R&D surveys) and the environment it operates in.

In terms of the R&D survey, problems include definitions of R&D where respondents struggle to determine what should be counted as R&D. Examples of these are R&D in the Social Sciences and Humanities and the R&D related to software development and clinical trials.

Under or over counting of researchers and the actual R&D expenditure may result if the following factors are not checked and verified:

Outsourced R&D activities across sectors, which are sometimes mistakenly counted as intramural R&D

Less than 100 per cent coverage of R&D performers where potential R&D performers are not all included in the survey especially in the business and Not-For-Profit sectors

High staff turnover, which is conspicuous in the government sector

Incorrect estimation of the Full Time Equivalents (FTEs) particularly in the higher education sector.

The main challenge with the innovation surveys is dealing with the persistent low response rates as the business sector complains that it is over-surveyed in South Africa.

Other general challenges faced by the unit are providing government and policy-makers with specific and detailed R&D and innovation statistics that are usually beyond CeSTII’s scope. The surveys collect aggregated data at higher levels than the users require. The issues here are that CeSTII is a small unit conducting surveys nationally, assuming the role of a national Statistic office and operating within a limited budget.

The challenges posed by human resources include finding and maintaining qualified human resources who can do survey work (client-driven research) and still function as researchers for other HSRC work (e.g. producing peer-reviewed journal articles). Conducting R&D surveys requires people who find obtaining the results of surveys interesting, challenging, and rewarding.

Finally, developing key research topics that could provide a focus for collaborative research without deviating from the requirements of HSRC and DST needs to be considered.

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8. Achievements of CeSTIICeSTII has increased its operations since its inception and its profile has been rising steadily. The challenge is how to maintain and sustain this status.

Some selected works performed by CeSTII and other colleagues are provided to illustrate the relevance and importance of measuring R&D, innovation and related science and technology activities in South Africa and other countries in The New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) so that national studies as well as international comparisons and benchmarking become possible.

a. Western Cape OECD territorial review (2007): Kahn, M.; Rumbelow, J.; Molotja, N. and Gastrow, M.

The study was conducted as part of a wider study, initiated by the OECD and provincial Western Cape (WC) department. The role of CeSTII was to provide data and analysis of the R&D activities and innovative capacity in the Western Cape. The work included commenting on the collaboration among Western Cape institutions, the R&D intensity, R&D infrastructure and researchers, firms operating in the province including their size, survival rate and the level of technology, as well as the policies in place for economic development

b. Measuring R&D in South Africa and in selected SADC countries: issues in implementing the Frascati Manual based surveys (2007): Kahn, M.; Blankley, W. and Molotja, N.

This paper outlines the national system of innovation in the South African context and how it is measured in terms of R&D surveys. The work further highlighted experiences and lessons learnt from the R&D survey. Issues of methodology, limitations and benefits of the survey were also described in detail. The paper is part of a process of UNESCO’s provision of an Annex on measuring R&D in developing countries for the next revision of the OECD Frascati Manual.

c. Flight of the Flamingos: a study on the mobility of R&D workers (2004): Kahn, M.; Blankley, W.; Maharajh, R.; Pogue, T.E.; Reddy,V.; Cele, G. and du Toit, M.

The study’s main objectives were to quantify the scale and nature of R&D personnel turnover and flow of highly-skilled human resources at a cross section of higher education institutions, SETI’s and industry and promote a deeper understanding of the concepts of ‘brain drain’, ‘brain gain’ and ‘brain circulation’.


Other roles undertaken by CeSTII include:

Assisting NACI in providing necessary information on the Review of South Africa’s Innovation Policy to the OECD. The objective of the review was to assist the South African government to optimize the existing innovation policy and instruments and, at the same time, learn from best universal policy practices (OECD, 2007).

Providing assistance to DST in evaluating the relevance and consistency of the indicators and targets for the Ten-Year plan: ‘Innovation toward the Knowledge-based Economy’

CeSTII has also assisted NEPAD in coordinating R&D and Innovation surveys in some African countries (CeSTII has so far worked with Malawi and Namibia and more collaborations with other African countries are pending).

9. Future perspectivesThe recent development by DST is the 10-year plan entitled “Innovation Towards a Knowledge-based Economy” which will consist of four elements:

Human Capital Development.

Knowledge generation and exploitation (R&D), and

Enablers to address the innovation gap between research results and socio-economic outcomes.

The 10-year plan will also rely on indicators and CeSTII may play a meaningful role in the provision of R&D and innovation statistics as well as in the development of new indicators, thus assisting the department to implement its plans over time.

Dealing with the shortcomings of the R&D surveys and outlining possible areas of collaboration including responding to the following issues:

Are policy issues that are specific to South Africa sufficiently covered by the work of CeSTII?

If not, what kind of action is currently being taken to improve data collection without diverging from the prescribed mechanisms currently in place?

Do the surveys provide relevant and useful information for the business sector (i.e. able to answer the typical business sector question of what is in it for us?).

Is there a basis for future research provided by the case studies which might focus on the following aspects, for example:

Researchers in the workforce, making use of existing data to explore issues such as research as a career in South Africa; what informs the research agendas of R&D practitioners in South Africa; and what is the policy context?The location of R&D: benchmarking the South African provinces to try and understand how R&D investments in each province affect regional performance and the rate of economic development.

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The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • 1�

A close analysis can be undertaken of the strengths and limitations of the business and public R&D data that are currently being collected and an examination made of their uses.

In conclusion, the outputs of CeSTII are a component of Official Statistics through a memorandum of understanding between STATS SA and DST. They are gathered and processed according to international methodology as recommended by the OECD and EUROSTAT. As such they are essential data that inform policy and investment decisions regarding the economy and further development.

CeSTII is in collaboration with neighbouring countries (Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, and Namibia) and is able to provide training and share experiences with other NEPAD countries on how to implement R&D and innovation surveys and develop S&T indicators and statistics. These processes can lead to a better understanding of the relative levels of knowledge of South Africa and neighbouring African economies, and of the contribution their S&T systems can make to economic and social development.

The work of CesTII has contributed to a number of activities including policymaking and analysis. Many countries are gearing themselves towards a knowledge-based economy and the need to develop indicators present CeSTII with opportunities to contribute towards these efforts.

1� • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

ReferencesBlankley, W. and Kahn, M. 2005. The History of Research and Experimental Development

Measurement in South Africa and Some Current Perspectives. In: South African Journal of Science 101, March-April 2005.

Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology (DACST). 1996. White Paper on Science and Technology, Pretoria: Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology.

Department of Science and Technology (DST). 2002. The National Research and Development, Strategy. Pretoria: Department of Science and Technology.

______. 2006. Ten-Year Plan: Innovation toward the Knowledge-based Economy.

European Commission. 2005. Key Figures on Science, Technology and innovation towards a European knowledge area.

Godin B. 2001. The Emergence of Science and Technology Indicators: Why did Governments Supplement Statistics with Indicators. Paper No. 8.

International Development Research Centre (IDRC). 1993. Towards a Science and Technology Policy For a Democratic South Africa: Mission Report. Ottawa, Canada. Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). 2002. Proposed Standard Practice for Surveys on Research and Experimental Development. Paris, OECD.

______. 2005. Main Science and Technology Indicators 2005. Paris, OECD.

______. 2007. Review of South Africa’s Innovation Policy. Paris, OECD.

The author would like to acknowledge the following persons: Demetre Labadarios, William Blankley, Natalie Vlotman, Julien Rumbelow, Cheryl Moses, Prudence Sotashe, Irma Wilkinson, Saahir Parker, Mamela Siwendu, Anthony Burns, Tembu Sibindlana, Karen Heath, Aeysha Semaar and Lezaan Muller.

Contact details:

Professor Neo Molotja,Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Indicators (CeSTII), Human Sciences Research Council,Private Bag X9182, Cape Town, 8000, South Africa.Tel: +27 21 466 7818, Fax +27 21 461 1255e-mail: [email protected]


PART2Case studies on knowledge systems:

higher education and universities

Chapter 2Building research universities in Africa: the challenges

Mammo Muchie

Chapter 3Towards inclusive systems of innovation and developmental

University systems: normative, empirical and policy perspectivesClaes Brundenius; Bengt-Aake Lundvall; Judith Sutz

Chapter 4Innovative public policy to link science with development:

Bolivarian University of Venezuela (BUV)Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona; María Cristina Parra-Sandoval;

Alicia Inciarte; Amalia Bohórquez

Chapter 5Universities in national development: perspectives on a second

academic revolution linked to a third industrial revolutionDavid Cooper

Chapter 6Needs-based knowledge processing through university-community

Partnerships: higher education inroads into rural communityDevelopment in Zimbabwe

Nduduzo Phuthi; Paul D. M. Gundani;Isaiah M. Sibanda; Stephen Matope; Champakh T. Parekh


Chapter 2Building research universities in Africa: the challenges

Mammo Muchie, Ethiopia

“Higher education is the modern world’s ‘basic education’, but developing countries are falling further and further behind. It‘s time to drive home a new message: higher education is no longer a luxury, it is essential to survival”

(H. Rosovosky, Harvard University).

AbstractIn this study it will be argued that research is critical for building productive power and the creation of wealth. It is better to have at least one research university in every African country than a national airline. If each country in Africa cannot afford to establish a research university and sustain it as part of building knowledge in each country’s economy and society, there is a need for each African region to establish a regional research university with the African Union and NEPAD’s support and engagement to sustain the effort. Research universities are key components of a country’s systems of political economy of production. Research is neither a luxury nor is a research university a white elephant. If knowledge for augmenting productive power is necessary, research is the ingredient and the institution that is best placed to create researchers and research remains a university. Doubts about the need to set up research universities in Africa should end and, instead, ways of making them effective pillars for building Africa’s productive and innovative capabilities should be promoted, with an acute awareness of much squandered time spent debating whether universities are necessary, instead of establishing them as part of the core producer of Africa’s innovation systems.

Chapter 2 Building research universities in Africa: the challenges


1. IntroductionAfrican universities are still slowly emerging from the difficulties they faced in the 1980s. The American Chronicle of Higher Education recently stated that “African universities’ capacity to educate new Ph.D. holders is eroding, raising deep concerns about the continent’s ability to produce new generations of academics, and educators” (The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2008). During 2000-2004 Africa produced only 1.8 per cent of the world’s publications. In comparison India produced 2.4 per cent and Latin America 3.5 per cent of the world’s research (Pouris and Pouris, 2007). Moreover it has been suggested that much of research is concentrated in only two African countries, South Africa, and Egypt”. These two countries produce just above 50 per cent of the continent’s publications and the top eight countries produce above 80 per cent of the continent’s research” (ibid.).

Africa’s inventive profile also shows that the continent needs to catch up; it produces less than one thousand of the world’s inventions, and 88 per cent of the continent’s inventive activity is located in South Africa (ibid.). When it comes to knowledge, research and higher education in Africa, the picture that emerges is unflattering regarding research and training, at all levels from the local, to the regional to the continental.

Some of the generalizations include the following:

Weak investment from national governments to promote continental knowledge infrastructure.

Weak horizontal mobility of knowledge, research, researchers, curriculum and innovation.

Movement of knowledge and trained people is still largely vertical, to and from the Northern hemisphere.

Obstacles and lack of incentives to stimulate inter-African knowledge communication.

Brain migration a real problem given lack of brain circulation within the continent. [Net immigration from SSA was 0.57 million in 1995: fell to 0.29 million in 2000; and then rose to 0.7 million in 2005. An estimated one third of these were university graduates. Remittances are US$22 billion for SSA (World Bank, 2009)].

Poor or no representation in national development plans and bi-lateral donor support.

Continuing ‘competition’ with universal primary education for popularity and extremely limited resources.

Migration of good quality staff and researchers, overseas or to the private sector.

Increasing age and retirement of senior and experienced staff with a decreasing number of candidates for replacement. [Adapted from the SARUA Strategic Plan 2007-2012 itself identifies some of the critical weaknesses that characterize the higher education system in the region].

National and regional needs for graduates far outweigh current higher education institutional capacity.

Low interest and too few graduates in science and technology.

Poor levels of quality research and publications.

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Cross-border regulatory obstacles to regional collaboration.

High dependence on international donors for the foreseeable future (ibid.).

It is clear that something must be done to change this unacceptable situation. Training, research, knowledge, invention and innovation must be priorities. Africa cannot afford to remain so far behind. It must catch up and it can catch up!

2. Changing problems into challenges and opportunitiesWhilst the problems are innumerable, they present more of a challenge rather than obstacles for us to try new ideas. To begin with, many universities in the 60s and 70s tried to build up training and research. In the 1980s there was a reversal of this healthy concept of universities as developmental, expressed by the concept of the “Developmental University” (Coleman, 1994), to a negative orientation towards research.

In the 1960s universities needed to develop specific skills for African development to establish a civil service, build up the teaching profession and provide skilled manpower for the economy. It is during the 60s that the concept of the developmental university was developed. There was an emphasis on an applied curriculum and on ‘useful’ learning. Higher education’s principal objective became manpower planning/human resource development. During the 1970s doubts emerged due largely to the poor quality of output, the mismatch of graduates to labour market demands, and to financial constraints owing to the 1971 world economic crises that led to unsettled external funding. The World Bank used narrow economic calculations to compare the economic return on investment in higher education to primary education. It claimed to make the discovery that primary education gave more value for money than investment in higher education. The economic crises of the 70s and 80s helped to making the rate-of-return on investment in education the assessment tool of choice for validating support for research, knowledge and training in Africa.

Moreover, in the 1980s demands for student fees and privatization were legitimized and external support for higher education declined drastically. The World Bank wrote four major policy documents, one of which focused entirely on Africa, which offered a critique of universities’ role in development. The universities reacted angrily and tried to defend their position, and students rioted in many campuses in Africa. Many post-colonial governments in Africa viewed knowledge and universities as threats. As a consequence, support from governments also waned. Universities’ positive role was questioned: their identity and value was compromised. Research became under-funded and downgraded; universities lost their best brains; some became consultants; others set up NGOs doing what came to be known as policy research, funded by external funders or donors. “What we received from the partners [World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF)] has been the Kiss of Death” (from a Gambian Minister of Education).

Overall in the 1980s, the positive effect to the economy from investment in higher education came under question. In fact the negative impact of higher education on economic development was stressed including an emphasis on graduates’ unemployability

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due to the low quality of graduates and the preponderance of students in social science and humanities as opposed to science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

The problem with the World Bank’s approach to higher education in Africa is a reliance on narrow economic accounting over broader considerations of the social and cultural impact of education, learning and knowledge through a combination of research and training.

In the 1990s both as a result of taking an integrated or holistic view of education and the ‘knowledge economy’ approach which argued for knowledge to emerge as a factor of production, public support for higher education in Africa began to be advocated. The World Bank also proposed funding universities, though it insisted student fees and privatization must be retained.

The attack on the universities and the loss that accompanied this over twenty years from the 1980s makes us wary that such attacks may re-occur unless the need for African research is anchored in the economics of knowledge for releasing the productive power of the individual, the nation and society, changing both the production system and creating transformative and developmental capability. We suggest that the formation of an African system of innovation will necessarily involve the acknowledgement that research is not a luxury but the ingredient for promoting productive power or energy, and the research university in Africa is not a white elephant. There is thus a need to strengthen the argument that a core component of a system of innovation is knowledge, and the latter is produced through research and universities even though there may be other ways of producing knowledge through experience and the laboratory of life.

An awareness that universities undermined represents not only knowledge undermined for productive power but also the loss of a core institutional component of a national system of innovation. Basic research will reappear with the acknowledgement of the need for research universities in Africa. The era of donor-user interaction for putting policy research on the agenda will change to one of establishing basic research on knowledge-producer and user interaction as part of the African system of innovation.

Finally there is now in the twenty-first century recognition of the value of research, higher education and knowledge in Africa due in part to the knowledge economy discourse and the World Bank’s change of attitude. There is the UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge which has been pivotal in promoting national research systems, research capacity and research training.

Whilst there is no longer a major ideological barrier, the reality on the ground for African universities is still difficult with a lack of concentration of talent, resources and acute governance crises. In addition, as late as November 2008 reports suggest that African universities still face a looming shortage of Ph.D’s. (The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2008).

“Research is no luxury”. [Berit Olsson, Director, Department of Research Cooperation: (Sida), Sweden)]. “It is a productive power” (Muchie, 2008). African Union and NEPAD have recommended 1 per cent of GDP to be spent by each African state on research. The Global Ministerial Forum on Research for Health, in its meeting in Bamako, Mali 17 to


19 November 2008, formally recommended 2 per cent of GDP be spent on health systems’ research as part of the development of national research systems. Countries like Botswana plan to upgrade their R&D over the next five years.

South Africa has a ten year innovation plan (2008-2018) put in place by the national leadership which has understood the importance of research and knowledge. Since 1994 the country has managed to double the science budget. The Government has planned to create 210 research chairs by 2010 and 500 by 2018. It has plans to produce 600 Ph.D’s., 300 of whom will be in science, technology and engineering, by 2018. It hopes to increase its rate of publication by 1.5 per cent from 0.5 per cent in 2006. Patent applications are expected to grow from 418 in 2004 to 2,100 by 2018. South Africa’s own patent office aims to expand from 4,721 patents in 2002 to 24,000 in 2018. South Africa intends to have five research universities recognized by international rating and eight Nobel laureates by that date (DST, 2008).

Thus we have in South Africa an important knowledge and research resource. The challenge is how to create research and researcher mobility to link this energy from South Africa to benefit other African countries in order to build up their research and researchers.

Whilst South Africa has its problems, it remains an inspiration in relation to much of Africa. The unacceptable research situation of Africa as a whole must change. It means training, and research must be put in place; and knowledge, invention and innovation must remain priorities. Africa cannot remain far behind after fifty years of colonial freedom.

African agency and independence is inseparably connected to establishing internal knowledge development. In fact Africa needs something like a knowledge revolution. Real decolonization is connected to the ability to create a strong research foundation and researchers. The failure of development in Africa is largely a lack of the ability to organize systems of innovation producers in general and the capability to generate research and knowledge independently to solve the multi-faceted problems faced by Africa.

We would propose that research, universities and knowledge are conceptualized in terms of the economics of productive power and systems of innovation frameworks. In doing so we argue against the use of the economics of circulation or exchange value-based allocation that has been behind much of the justification to frame narrowly whether Africa needs universities or not.

As elsewhere, universities in Africa form a central knowledge-producing component in any national system of innovation. It is important that universities produce high quality output and value for money. But arguments for value for money and quality of output should not be used to deflect universities from their core identities and functions. They must continue to produce research, knowledge and build people with skills and knowledge by the training they offer. Changing their research to targeted user-demand research such as policy research and creating many research NGOs on an ad hoc basis that carry out consultancy and write reports under the guise of doing research is not acceptable.



3. A conceptual framework for research development in Africa

Research, research universities, and researcher cost money. That is no surprise. Though in the long term research is undeniably beneficial, societies have to absorb the cost in the short run.

The rate-of-return on investment is likely to be negative in the short run when investing in building research universities but the broader impact on education, learning and knowledge may be large in the medium to long term, even calculated in narrow economic and investment terms. But there are a host of other benefits that a research culture based in Africa can generate in the making of and the strengthening of the African system of innovation.

The economic theory that informed such narrow calculations is neo-classical, based on circulation or exchange-value allocative (Price is equal to marginal cost) economics. What we propose here is productive power or energy-based economics. The conceptual approach of this lays stress on the notion that what creates or makes the causes of wealth is something totally different from wealth itself. The ability to produce wealth, found in the form of raw materials and mineral commodities, is more important than circulating existing wealth. Wealth creation depends on knowledge, and knowledge depends on research and training. Thus research is a form of productive power or energy. It can drive the process of economic development and wealth creation. For example, research on a unified field theory in physics led by serendipity to the creation of the world-wide web. Now there is a huge global economy based on various ventures and transactions through the www.com economy.

Adam Smithian or neo-classical exchangeable value economics assumes the production of goods and services and not the power to produce them in the first place. What matters are the value considerations underlying the exchange and circulation of commodities. But an independent theory of productive power is necessary to appreciate the importance of investing in research and training for innovation. The theory of productive power of wealth creation is driven by innovation, technical progress, and continuous improvement of the quality of human capital or graduates. Africa suffered from the World Bank’s application of neo-classical economic doctrine. This narrow allocative economics of existing factors of production and goods and services based on the market can always return despite the pressure to mix markets and states due to the global economic and financial crises confronting countries and national economies today. Thus there is a particular need to locate research, knowledge, and the production of quality researchers in Africa as an application of the productive power.

Another important reason why research, knowledge and building research universities is necessary is related to the choice or need to absorb already innovated products elsewhere or establish or embed systems of innovation policies, institutions, and incentives to create new knowledge and innovation in the local and national context. There is a marked difference between the suppliers of innovations and those who demand innovation. Those who supply always become front runners. Those who demand are latecomers. How can the latecomers become also front runners? That depends on the national systems of

http://www.com


political economy of production and innovation involving internal infrastructure and the capability for creating and absorbing new knowledge.

The most interesting perspective regarding the hybridization of both the creation and absorption potential not only in the developed countries but also in the developing countries has come from the Globelics research community – the first Globelics Conference was launched in Rio in 2003. (Muchie, et al., 2003). This community, though heterogeneous, has attempted to construct a synthesis where the spectrum of innovative potential does not exclude poor African countries from being innovators themselves, as well as absorbers, by interacting with the industrialized technology producers. In other words in the view of Globelics, the spectrum from creation to absorption can exist at the same time though perhaps in different leading sectors. Poor African countries can combine being innovators and producers of new technologies and also be adopters of innovations produced at the world’s science, technology and innovation frontiers. In fact, being innovators facilitates absorption of new technologies, and conversely absorption of new technologies can strengthen institutions and their practices, thus encouraging internal innovation creation. Both are linked and mutually reinforcing.

For example, African countries have rare resources in agriculture and health which they often sell in raw form. If they can add value by converting raw material into manufactured goods through innovative potential, they will gain much for development. It is important not to allow institutions to establish a development policy which only makes use of new technology. They need to build institutions and practices which generate their own innovation capability without closing off learning from outside.

What is needed is to combine together knowledge, innovation, learning and capability building and to suggest research applicable to the problems of development and underdevelopment. This can achieved by establishing national innovation and development systems that create internal and indigenous innovative capabilities, as well as making use of innovations and knowledge drawn from external sources. The creation of a system, with its actors, policies, institutions and knowledge, which both creates innovation, and absorbs innovation from elsewhere, thus strengthens the internal and endogenous innovation system.

What is interesting is that regardless of how Africa’s possibilities are perceived or understood, a number of countries in Africa have made innovation plans. South Africa has a ten year innovation plan where the Government uses a number of policies to enhance an internally generated innovation environment as a launch pad for the independent integration of word technology circuits [Department of Science and Technology (DST), 2008]. Some countries like Botswana wish to increase their R&D from its current level of less than half of 1 per cent to 1 per cent of GDP in five years.

Thus countries that plan to develop their national innovation systems will differ if they plan to be innovation producers and absorbers or mainly absorbers and not innovation creators. This has an impact on their practices, plans, policies and institutions to produce or absorb knowledge through appropriate incentive systems.

The creation of innovation requires that a country must have at least one research university or specialized research institute. The researchers require resources, other researchers, experience, knowledge, ideas, creativity, skills, equipment, and materials and



active creative networks. Their research output can be produced for either commercial or non-commercial purposes. If they are products, services and processes they may be commercialized. If the research produces knowledge for capability, theories, discoveries, or new methods, it may be used for further research and training. Even knowledge that appears in patents and publications may not be commercialized. Institutional arrangements that facilitate a research system equipped with research inputs to create research outputs, and research outcomes, and to impact on the economy is essential for sustaining a transformation process capable of transition to the level of industrial economies.

The problem is that building internal research capacity, spending R&D and other resources for creating innovation is more expensive than the resources that may be needed to absorb and procure new technology. This may also be related to the possible deployment of human resources to learn what others have created rather than to deploy resources for creating new technologies. An easier route may be to apply acquired technology to stimulate endogenous innovation.

Since there is no free new technology market, it may not be easy for poorer economies to acquire technologies which may enable them to create indigenized innovation systems. Poor African countries have to aim to create innovation and not be mere recipients through donor and foreign direct investment of technology transfer.

Remaining an innovation absorber could lead to dependency, thus creating a low technology trap which could lead to a vicious circle. Though it may be costly it may not be wise to abandon the search to indigenize innovation systems, by laying the foundation of a national system of innovation that combines innovation creation and at the same time innovation absorption. The lack of an endogenous innovation system may also weaken the capability to import, absorb and modify new technology.

Africa needs innovation systems which offer both endogenous and absorptive capabilities to generate a development strategy where the value of research is embedded and not externalized. Something like an African National Innovation, Learning and Development Systems (ANILDS) that combines innovation creation inside and innovation absorption from outside is necessary to establish a knowledge foundation and infrastructure for Africa’s sustained development and transformation. (See Graph 1).

The value of this new concept is to integrate innovation creation with the capacity for innovation absorption and emphasize that productive power and the capital of the mind is critical to both innovation creation and absorption and wealth creation and development in Africa and for Africa. It is on this foundation that the structural transformation of poor African countries can occur, to realize the full benefit of integration with world technology leaders on the basis of autonomy and a specific African national economy’s own expressed agency.

Innovation creators and innovation absorbers in the context of a poor African country require different institutions, networks, policies, actors, human resources, incentives and capabilities. Innovation creators can absorb new technologies, as has been evidenced in a number of countries. In the case of African economies, the innovation absorbers from outside may or may not become innovation creators unless internally embedded knowledge production through rigorous research and human resources is also provided.


4. ConclusionThe economics of Smithian exchange value has dominated research, knowledge and the production of researchers. The damage to Africa has been severe. This view of economics is still dominant and may be re-applied to make Africa a non-creator of African research universities. The danger is real. It is thus critical to conceptualise, locate and protect Africa’s needs to create research from the point of view of the theory of productive power. Research universities create research that is also productive power, thus positioning research, research systems and researchers as part of Africa’s innovation system. It is necessary to appreciate the economic value of research and researchers with a broader social rate of return rather than a narrow economic rate-of-return.

In Africa both research and the African research university are key components of the making of African national systems of innovation. The appreciation of research as productive power, a necessity and not a luxury is critical for progress. Research and researchers constitute part and parcel of the efforts to generate a functioning science, technology and innovation system within African borders.

Graph 1. Building Africa’s national innovation learning and development systems

Africa’s NationalInnovation Learning

and DevelopmentSystem (ANILDS)

Includes both Endogenous(Creative) and Absorptive

Capabilities

Investment & Infrastructure:R&D Investment (public & private),

Venture Capital, and Foreign DirectInvestment (FDI).

Investment in Education andHuman Resources Development

Investment in Infrastructure

such as ICT

Incentives (Economic andRegulatory):

Return on R&D Investments,

Appropriation through Intellectual

Property,Competitive Market and Pricing,Industry-Government Research

Partnership, Recognition and

Financial Reward

Regulatory Standards that Drive New

Innovations..

Institutions and Relations:

Domestic & Foreign Firms,

Universities, Public R&D

Organizations, FinancialInstitutions

Linkages/ Relations betweenthese Institutions

Policy Setting:

Economic and Industrial Policies

S&T Policy

Education Policy

Human Resources Development

Policy



Africans should continue to combine policy, resources and talent in order to stimulate productive power to create sustainable research. Neither is research a luxury, nor is a research university a white elephant: that is the starting point to build research as productive power to fuel Africa’s sustainable transformation.

References Coleman, J.S. 1994. The Idea of the Developmental University. In: Coleman, J.S.

Nationalism and Development in Africa: Selected Essays, Sklar, R.L. (ed.), Berkeley: University of California Press (UCP).

Department of Science and Technology (DST). 2008. South African Ten Year Innovation Plan (2008-2018), Pretoria, South Africa.

Lindow, M. 2008. African Universities Face a Looming Shortage of Ph.D.’s. In: The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Muchie, M. 2008. Research Universities for Eradication of Poverty. Presentation at the UNESCO Forum’s Global Research Seminar, “Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems”, 28 and 29 November 2008.

Muchie, M.; Lundvall, B.-Å. and Gammeltoft, P. (eds.). 2003. Putting Africa First: The Making of African Innovation Systems. Rio: Publisher: Aalborg University.

Pouris, A. and Pouris, A. 2007. The State of Science and Technology in Africa (2000-2004), A Scientometric Assessment 79, 2009. International Journal of Scientometrics. In Proceedings ISSI 2007.

South African Regional Universities Association (SARUA). Strategic Plan 2007-2012.

The Chronicle of Higher Education, Tuesday, 25 November 2008, http://chronicle.com/weekly/v55/i06/06a02403.htm

World Bank. 2008. Accelerating Catch Up: Teritiary Education for Growth in sub-Saharan Africa. Publisher: World Bank.

Contact details:

Professor Mammo MuchieDirector,Research Centre on Development and International Political Economy,NRF/DST Research Chair on Innovation, IERT, TUT and Aalborg University,Fibigerstræde 2 - 8a,DK-9220 Aalborg Ø, Denmark.e-mail: [email protected]

http://chronicle.com/weekly/v55/i06/06a02403.htm



Chapter �Towards inclusive systems of innovation and developmental university systems: normative, empirical and policy perspectives

Claes Brundenius, Sweden • Bengt-Åake Lundvall, Denmark • Judith Sutz, Uruguay

IntroductionIt has become almost trivial to assert that in the information society, the knowledge society or the learning economy, universities are very important institutions. This consensus notwithstanding, questions such as “In what sense are those institutions important?” and “For whom are they important?” are far from receiving unanimous answers. Should the major function be to promote higher education in order to serve all sectors of society or should the emphasis be to engage in research and to examine what the relationships are between the two types of activities? And what should a ‘third mission’ encompass: a broad interaction with society or just an interaction with the business sector aiming at promoting technical innovation in high technology? Nobody argues in favour of ‘ivory towers’ but the relative autonomy of universities may be seen as a prerequisite for universities to function as ‘central banks’ that validate knowledge in the knowledge-based society.

The purpose of this paper is to help clarify the debate. In Section 1 we present results from the UniDev-project demonstrating differences and similarities between university systems in more or less developed economies. In Section 2 we point to inequality as a major barrier for economic development in the knowledge-based economy, and in Section 3 we take a fresh look at the ‘third mission’ seen from this perspective. On the basis of the empirical, analytical and normative analysis, Sections 4 and 5 outline the contours of a developmental university system.

Section 1. The UniDev project – A synthesis of project resultsBy examining the changing role of academic institutions within the context of innovation and economic growth and development, the project establishes a new and important conceptual and policy link between the work of development agencies, and the methodologies and approaches of national innovation policy and innovation agencies. The project has been working with national teams in twelve countries (Brazil, China, Cuba, Denmark, Germany, Latvia, Russian Federation, South Africa, Sweden, Tanzania, Uruguay and, Viet Nam). It is interesting that in spite of different economic systems (ranging from liberal market economies to socialist economies), different levels of development and

Chapter 3 Towards inclusive systems of innovation and developmental university systems: normative, empirical and policy perspectives


different roles in national innovation systems, the role of higher education (and especially that of universities) is a hot topic in all the countries (Brundenius-Göransson, 2009).

The project has two major components: (i) a mapping of the current situation and role of higher education in the national innovation system, and (ii) a special in-depth survey of the so called ‘Third Mission’ of universities, and how various stakeholders view this mission in the twelve countries. We will here provide a summary of the results based on the country reports. Some basic quantitative data are shown in Table 1 below.

The UniDev countries are listed by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita level Parity Purchasing Power (PPP). The data in Table 1 gives some idea about differences with respect to the Human Development Index (HDI) and the public commitment to education in general and to tertiary (higher) education in particular. HDI follows grosso modo the GDP ranking with the exception of South Africa (falling from 5th to 11th position) and Cuba (rising from 9th to 6th position). UniDev has three countries with high GDP per capita levels of living (HICs) (Denmark, Germany and Sweden), three with upper medium-income levels (UMICs) (Latvia, Russia, South Africa), four with medium-income levels (MICs) (Brazil, China, Cuba and Uruguay,), and two low-income countries (LICs) (Tanzania and Viet Nam). The first group of countries also stands out as regards expenditure on education with one exception. Cuba has the highest spending of the UniDev countries on education in general as a percentage of GDP, and has also a high percentage of spending with respect to higher education (5th place). China also has a relatively high ranking with respect to education in general.

Table 1. Some basic data for the UniDev countries around 2005

Country (ranked after GDP/cap. level)

GDP per capita (PPP)

Human development index

Government expenditure on education as % of GDP

Government expenditure on education per capita (PPP)

Government expenditure on tertiary education per capita (PPP)

Private expenditures on tertiary education (% of total)

Denmark 33973 (1) 0.95 (2) 8.5 (2) 2888 (1) 866 (1) 11.1

Sweden 32525 (2) 0.96 (1) 7.4 (3) 2407 (2) 647 (2) 5.3

Germany 29461 (3) 0.94 (3) 4.6 (7) 1355 (3) 325 (3) 9.1

Latvia 13646 (4) 0.86 (4) 5.4 (5) 723 (4) (80) (6) 53.8

South Africa 11 110 (5) 0.67 (11) 5.4 (4) 600 (6) 96 (5) n.a.

Russia 10845 (6) 0.80 (7) 3.6 (9) 390 (7) (76) (7) 12.2*

Uruguay 9962 (7) 0.85 (5) 2.6 (10) 259 (10) 52 (9) 9.8

Brazil 8402 (8) 0.80 (8) 4.4 (8) 370 (8) 37 (10) 70.3

Cuba 6800 (9) 0.84 (6) 9.8 (1) 666 (5) 147 (4) 0.0

China 6757 (10) 0.78 (9) 5.3 (6) 358 (9) 75 (8) n.a.

VietNam 3071 (11) 0.73 (10) 1.8 (12) 55 (11) 15 (11) 10.4*

Tanzania 744 (12) 0.67 (12) 2.2 (11) 16 (12) 5 (12) 12.9*

*Share of tertiary enrolments.PPP = Parity Purchasing Power; GDP = Gross Domestic Product.Source: UNESCO, UNDP and UniDev country reports.


However, if we translate this relative spending pattern into money terms [Parity Purchasing Power (PPP) per capita], we see notable differences: the richer countries spend much more in money terms in spite of relatively small differences in percentage terms. The gap is in fact quite large. While Denmark devotes 866 PPP per capita to higher education, the corresponding figure is only 96 in South Africa, 52 in Uruguay, 37 in Brazil, 15 in Viet Nam and 1 in Tanzania. China and especially Cuba are UniDev countries that rank higher in their commitment to education, including higher education, than their corresponding income levels.

Data on the role of private financing of higher education are not so easy to get, partly due to the rather imprecise definition of what private higher institutions comprise. The data in the seventh column should therefore be read with some caution, and the data do in some instances refer to share of enrolments, and not share of expenditures and are thus not necessarily comparable.

Table 2 compares tertiary enrolment ratios and the role of universities in research. These data can give some indication of the importance of universities in the national systems of innovation. Gross enrolment ratios (GER) are high, or very high, in Denmark, Latvia, Russia, Sweden and Cuba; moderately high in Germany and Uruguay; low in Brazil, China, South Africa and Viet Nam and very low in Tanzania. If we look at GERD (Gross Expenditure on R&D), we see a quite similar pattern with public expenditure on education (Table 4). GERD as a percentage of GDP ranges from 3.86 in Sweden to 0.1 percent in Tanzania. China, however, has an exceptionally high GERD (1.34 per cent) in relation to its income level. The Chinese exception becomes especially noteworthy when we look at BERD (Business Expenditure on R&D), which accounts for 71 per cent of all R&D in China, and places China in company with Sweden, Denmark, Germany and Russia.

Table 2. UniDev: Tertiary enrolments and the role of university R&D around 2005

Country (ranked after GDP per capita)

Tertiary Enrolment Ratios (GER)

GERD as % of GDP

BERD as % of GERD

University R&D as % of GERD

GERD per capita (PPP)

University R&D per capita (PPP)

Denmark 80 (2) 2.45 (3) 67.0 (4) 26.3 (5) 822 (2) 216 (2)

Sweden 82 (1) 3.86 (1) 74.9 (1) 20.5 (7) 1239 (1) 254 (1)

Germany 50 (6) 2.51 (2) 69.6 (3) 16.5 (9) 764 (3) 126 (3)

Latvia 74 (3) 0.57 (8) 40.5 (8) 41.5 (1) 74 (8) 30 (4)

SouthAfrica 15 (11) 0.87 (7) 58.1 (6) 21.6 (6) 97 (5) 21 (6)

Russia 71 (4) 1.07 (5) 66.4 (5) 6.3 (11) 128 (4) 8 (7)

Uruguay 41 (7) 0.26 (10) 48.0 (7) 32.0 (4) 25 (10) 8 (7)

Brazil 24 (8) 0.92 (6) 40.3 (9) 39.0 (2) 77 (7) 30 (5)

Cuba 61 (5) 0.56 (9) 29.4 (10) 35.3 (3) 34 (9) 8 (7)

China 20 (9) 1.34 (4) 70.9 (2) 9.1 (10) 91 (6) 8 (7)

VietNam 16 (10) 0.19 (11) 20.0 (11) 21.0 5 (11) 1 (11)

Tanzania 1 (12) 0.10 (12) n.a. n.a. 1 (12) n.a.

Source: Brundenius-Göransson (2008).



Interesting new patterns appear when we look at University R&D (5th column). Here the situation is in many instances the reverse. For instance Brazil, Cuba, Latvia and Uruguay all have higher shares of University R&D (as percentage of GERD) than the more developed countries, even if the causal relationship is far from clear. It might be that governments in many of the developing UniDev countries give high priority to university research – often as a means of building bridges to industry: on the other hand this perhaps rather reflects the weak BERD sector of these countries. University R&D is in contrast quite weak in Russia and China – both in relative terms and in terms of PPP per capita. The weak university research sector in these countries is a reflection of the past (centrally planned) system, where most research was carried out in specialized government research institutes.

Current debate on the role of universities

The country teams organized national workshops to discuss preliminary findings with various stakeholders: universities, government, policy-makers, business representatives, and the research community at large. In some of these national workshops participants discussed the role of universities in society and were asked to rank the 4-5 most critical areas (‘hottest issues’) from a list, common for all the countries. The result is shown in Table 6 below (in some cases the ranking was made by the national teams). There are many common concerns but there are also interesting country differences.

At the top of the list in all countries is, not surprisingly, financing. Finance of higher education usually comes from the public budget and there are competing priorities, especially in developing countries. There are thus pressures on universities both to prove their social relevance and to prove their cost-efficiency for education as well as research. The question of privatizing higher education institutions has in some instances been an option and establishing university-industry links has been another. Privatization, however, does not seem to be a big issue any longer, except in Denmark, Tanzania and Uruguay. In Uruguay there is only one public university and that might explain the interest in private complements.

The second hottest issue is not surprisingly the relevance of university research. This is a topic heatedly discussed in all parts of the UniDev spectrum: from Sweden and Germany to Russia, Brazil, Uruguay and Viet Nam. It is interesting to note that this does appear to be a big issue in Cuba and Latvia – two countries with the highest share of University R&D (see aforementioned Table 2).

The quality of education is the third hottest topic, ranging from Sweden to Cuba, Viet Nam, Tanzania and South Africa. In Cuba the quality of education has lately become of increasing concern to the government. One reason is the consequences of the massive surge in university enrolments since the beginning of 2000 in a drive towards the ‘universalization of higher education’. There is, understandably, a serious lack of qualified university teachers in the initial period – before the system can supply a sufficient number of qualified teachers.

�0 • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

Table 3. Major Issues in the current university debate in twelve countries

Major issues Swed

en

Den

mar

k

Ger

man

y

Latv

ia

Russ

ia

Bra

zil

Cub

a

Uru

guay

Chin

a

Vie

t Nam

Tanz

ania

S. A

fric

a

Funding X X X X X X X X X X X X

Allocationofresources X X X

Governance X X X

Lowsalaries X X X

Accesstohighereducation X X

Privatevs.public X X X

RelevanceofuniversityR&D X X X X X X

Socialinclusion/relevance X X X X

Gender/minorities X X X*

Quality X X X X X

Integrationofuniversitieswithresearch

X

Technologytransferissues X X X X

DeclininginterestinS&T X X

* Majorities!Source: Brundenius-Göransson (2008).

Low salaries may be related to the issue of quality of education since it might be difficult to recruit good university teachers and university researchers if salary levels are low (in relation to other occupations). This is at least the case in Cuba, Russia and Uruguay.

The social inclusion and social relevance of universities is an issue that is being debated in Sweden, Brazil, Uruguay and China. However, it should be emphasized that ‘social inclusion’ can be interpreted in different ways. For some people it refers to university enrolment policies; in other words it is almost synonymous with access to higher education. This might explain the difference in this context between Sweden and Denmark. The same goes for gender/minorities that can also be interpreted in terms of inclusion/exclusion. The South African answer is interesting: social inclusion/exclusion is not a minority problem it is a problem for the (non-white) majorities!


The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • �1

Section 2. A key starting point that challenges the orientation of knowledge productionThe Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) proposed twenty years ago an ambitious programme to put the region on the high road of development: “Productive Transformation with Equity”. Whether the region as a whole underwent a productive transformation of the scope proposed by ECLAC, that is, enabling it to join the ‘knowledge based and innovation driven economy’ is a moot point; as is also whether some of the countries of the region underwent such a transformation. What is unmistakably true is that in no case was it a transformation ‘with equity’, but ‘with inequity’. ECLAC recently recognized the fact that even if productive transformations took place, (and in some countries poverty reduction underwent impressive gains), ‘inequality defeated us’.

The following map, showing the Gini Index for several countries, underlines this. The lower the Gini indexes, the lower the inequality: few developing countries are in the range of Gini Indexes’ values between forty and forty-five; most them have values above fifty, indicating severe levels of inequality. Latin America appears as the most unequal region of the world.

There are powerful reasons to be worried about the inequalities that add new challenges to the overwhelmingly complex and pressing problem of poverty. The arguments require clarification, because it is they which lie behind the proposal to foster developmental university systems.

Map 1. Gini Index for several countries


One important reason is rather philosophical, and is expressed by Amartya Sen: “To be excluded from common facilities or benefits that others have can certainly be a significant handicap that impoverishes the lives that individuals can enjoy. No concept of poverty can be satisfactory if it does not take adequate note of the disadvantages that arise from being excluded from shared opportunities enjoyed by others” (Sen, 2000). The importance of this statement lies in the concept of inequality that it encompasses: it is not just income inequality, but ‘being excluded from common facilities or benefits that others have’. It is enough to think about health to grasp the importance of this formulation. A second reason is historical: economic historians committed to explain the processes of convergence and divergence in development trajectories have found that inequality is paramount in the explanations they propose. The third reason is political: inequality is a main source of social unrest. As Albert Hirschman put it: “tolerance of inequality is like a credit that has an expiration date” (Hirschman, 1981). A fourth reason is empirical: there are no examples of countries that in the last fifty years have undergone a sustainable process of development, including important rates of economic growth, that at the beginning of such a process have been highly unequal.

The question of inequality is not a new one. What is perhaps more pressing nowadays is the relation between knowledge, as a main driver of economic and social transformation, and inequality. The market-driven policies for economic growth fuelled inequality, being one of the worst consequences of the so called ‘Washington Consensus’ recommendations for developing countries. Science, technology, innovation and higher education played almost no role in these recommendations. However, emphasis solely on economic growth to achieve trickle-down consequences for the rest of the developmental issues, including inequality, led to the conceptualization of knowledge mainly as a tool for such growth and as part of the positive trickle-down process.

When the social disaster that followed the application of the ‘Washington Consensus’ recommendations became apparent, social policies were put in place to try to redress the situation, but the combination between almost unchanged policies for growth and policies to redress the negative social effects of such growth policies, at least in terms of equality, was far from successful. Knowledge, innovation and higher education, got trapped in the ‘old’ trickle-down hypothesis, continuing to be seen mainly as an economic tool. Moreover, the impact of some types of innovations on inequality was not seriously acknowledged, even if such impacts were well documented (Rogers, 1995). We suggest that to achieve developmental goals, and to further equality, universities, need to get rid of the trickle-down hypothesis and address the goals of knowledge and innovation in a fairly direct way. This leads us to propose that ‘inclusive knowledge systems’ are needed as well as developmental university systems.


The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • ��

Section 3. A fresh look at the ‘Third Mission’ of universitiesThe knowledge economy is not without qualification: in fact it is a capitalist knowledge economy (Arocena and Sutz, 2003)1. Some scholars, looking particularly into the evolution of American universities, have even coined the expression ‘academic capitalism’. So the question of the feasibility of counter tendencies is a thorny one: what are the chances of fostering inclusive knowledge systems and developmental university systems in the midst of the current capitalist knowledge economy and the marked trend towards academic capitalism?

In developing a possible answer to this question it is worth recalling that the expected roles of universities have evolved with time. We have recently witnessed the transformation of universities from academic places ruled by a ‘CUDOS + extension’ normative setting into academic places ruled by a ‘PLACE’ normative setting. ‘CUDOS’ refers to the well known Mertonian ‘ideal type’ of normative behaviour in science: communality, universality, lack of self-interest, originality and analytical skepticism. For a long time universities were supposed to be committed mainly to developing knowledge and to validating it through the norms of the academic community, as well as to teaching it; in some places, the diffusion of that knowledge for economic or social goals was conceived as a third mission alongside the other two. Proprietary, Local, Authoritative, Commissioned, Expert (PLACE) is the way John Ziman synthesized the transition of the research system in recent decades (Ziman, 1994, 2000): particularly telling is the contrast between the Mertonian communalism and the growing proprietary nature of knowledge today. Without pretending that an inescapable force is pushing universities all around the world away from a stylized ‘CUDOS+extension’ – like system towards a ‘PLACE’- like system, it is true that a trend in that direction is discernable. The question of a new shift in the orientation of universities’ commitments is logically possible, given that it has occurred already; the likelihood of achieving a ‘production of knowledge for social inclusion’ type of university commitment can be seen as rather illusory, given the strength of current trends. But for the moment our argument is more concerned with the need for such commitment for developmental purposes than with its likelihood, to which we shall turn later.

We refer to ‘socially inclusive knowledge production’ to emphasize the purposeful action towards producing knowledge with the explicit aim of solving some of the pressing problems of those ‘being excluded from common facilities or benefits that others have’. This aim can be extended to the support of production, particularly for small- and medium- enterprises that find it particularly difficult to buy ready-made solutions in the world market, and could benefit from a more ‘tailor-made’ approach to their knowledge needs. The argument at stake is to recognize that this type of problem faces not only a lack of financial resources to buy solutions wherever they are, but often the nonexistence of solutions. When this is due to the lack of a proper market for the unresolved problems, as in the case of health problems affecting mainly the very poor in developing countries,

1. In that paper, the concept of ‘capitalist knowledge economy’ is referred to the definition of capitalism provided by Michael Mann: “Following Marx, I define capitalism in the following terms: 1. Commodity production. Every factor of production, including labor, is treated as a means, not an end in itself, is given exchange value, and is exchangeable against any other factor. Thus capitalism is a diffuse form of economic power…” (Mann, 1993: 23-24).

�� • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

the expression “neglected problems” has been proposed – in the case of health, WHO and ‘Doctors Without Borders’ proposed the term “neglected diseases” which is widely used today. But even when problems do have solutions that work well in the conditions of developed countries, such solutions can be totally out of reach for a developing country.

The example of the vaccine against Haemophilus Influenza Type b is a particularly telling example, given that is an efficient solution to stop children under five years to suffer from pneumonia, meningitis and different kinds of sepsis; its success in the developed world was extraordinary. However, at a cost of US$100 a dose, it was in fact a ‘non-existent’ solution for countries where the whole scheme of infant vaccination is around a few dollars a year. A Cuban university team, led by Vicente Vérez-Bencomo, in cooperation with a Canadian University, developed, after fifteen years’ research, a synthetic vaccine, the first of this type in the world, delivering a very cheap manufacturing procedure (Vérez-Bencomo, et al. 2004). This is an example of a research agenda driven by a concern for social inclusion.

It would be dangerously misleading to suggest that all university research should be put under the umbrella of being immediately relevant for this type of concern. Just as misleading is the suggestion, often found in developing countries, that all university research should be placed under the umbrella of what the business sector considers important. The point is that, for developmental purposes, a ‘Third Mission’ for universities, related to addressing the extremely complex problems affecting the majority of the population in developing countries, is imperative.

Section 4. The developmental university in socially inclusive systems of innovationUniversities are central institutions of National Systems of Innovation (NSI). They have been relatively neglected for some time in NSI’s approaches, overshadowed by the weight of macro-institutional (policies) and micro-institutional (firms) analytical concerns. Nowadays, however, they have fully entered the realm of theoretical as well as empirical work within the NSI’s approach. What universities can achieve is framed by the system of innovation in which they are immersed. So, a university third mission oriented by social concern can only flourish if the whole national system of innovation is geared, at least partially, to achieve knowledge-based innovative solutions for the problems of the less favoured population. Knowledge-based innovative solutions include intensive R&D as well as smart design: knowledge, even of diverse types, is present in both types of solutions. Isolated developmental universities cannot survive for long; their developmental inspiration needs to be nurtured by putting the achieved results into practice. This requires ‘inclusive innovation systems’.

We already know that innovation policies inspired by the trickle-down hypothesis of economic growth do not lead to such innovation systems. Innovation policies of this type plus social policies mainly concerned with redistribution issues not only have proved ineffective in redressing inequality, but do not make room for a new type of knowledge involvement of universities. A demand for local intellectual participation in the search



for solutions derived from social needs is required to allow an inclusive university third mission to expand.

However, this requires not only ‘internal’ university policies, but national policies as well. Innovation policies conceived in part as social policies are required, having as part of the mandate for fostering innovation the requirement to solve social problems. We are not proposing that the whole innovation policy or the whole social policy should be geared to socio-innovative concern. What we do suggest is that without such concerns, a third mission of social concern for universities cannot be expected to flourish.

Fuelled by socially inclusive national systems of innovation, universities willing to embrace this kind of third mission will need to undergo an extensive range of changes, affecting not only teaching approaches and research agenda settings, but also how the academic rewards systems are conceived and applied. Universities that embarked upon this kind of reform or transformation are what we call developmental universities.

Section 5. Difficulties and opportunities for developmental university systemsThe road ahead towards developmental universities or developmental university systems – a term that tries to convey the idea of different types of universities fulfilling different profiles but all concerned primarily with developmental problems – is not simple. We can mention four types of difficulties facing the deployment of such types of university systems.

First, there is a lack of understanding of the concept of National Systems of Innovation. In many developing countries, the concept of NSI has been expressed in mechanistic, bureaucratic, and organizational terms, giving rise to a list of institutions that belong to the NSI and a series of arrows between them indicating the linkages that should be in place. Universities tend not to be conceptualized as part of a system, but as akin to ‘bowling alone’ institutions, making it even more difficult to promote a new ‘developmental’ mission.

A second difficulty is associated with some theoretical inadequacies related to innovation, or problem-solving activities, in developing countries. If innovation is conceptualized in the same way as in any developed country, the universities’ role is to assure scientific excellence and little more; if innovation is seen mainly as not rooted in R&D activities, research universities do not seem to be needed. Only when the specificities of innovation in scarcity conditions are addressed does the need for knowledge-based solutions become apparent, as well as the role that universities can play to foster research agendas.

A third difficulty relates to the academic reward system and its inertia. The search for solutions to the problems that affect deprived populations is usually long and strenuous. It often involves doing things differently and not necessarily discovering something radically new. Developmental university systems cannot grow strong unless they explicitly include academic rewards for this type of enquiry.

1.

2.

3.


A fourth difficulty has to do with the translation of ‘problems of the people’ into ‘research problems’. Usually, many of the problems relatively deprived people have are seen mainly as resulting from social unfairness, and so finding solutions in the realm of research seems to make little sense. On the other hand, building socially committed research agendas from below implies talking to people in order to understand how they perceive their problems; such perception, understandably, does not lead straightforwardly to clear-cut research projects. Innovative interdisciplinary work is needed to assure that an accurate translation from perceived problems into research agendas aimed at their solution is in place.

These difficulties are not only complicated to solve; it is even complex to acknowledge their existence. The opportunities to recognize and to address them, lies first of all in the social commitment of researchers all over the world, from all disciplines. A feeling of uneasiness, of absurdity in the face of the huge gap between the might of knowledge and the unresolved problems such knowledge does not even address, is affecting a steadily growing part of the academic community. Another opportunity relates to the intellectual challenge involved: solving complex problems differently can provide the kind of excitement every true researcher is looking for. Finally, there is a new global awareness about the need to put every effort into making use of science and into looking for new science to find answers to very old problems – as well as to new problems. This opens opportunities to legitimize developmentally inspired research and teaching agendas.

Once the aim is stated, the difficulties to fulfill it identified, and the opportunities to overcome these difficulties outlined, the task ahead seems to be clearer. Research around these issues can now follow new empirical paths, taking specific contexts into account and refining questions as well as provisional answers.

ReferencesArocena, R. and Sutz, J. 2003. Knowledge, Innovation and Learning: Systems and Policies

in the North and in the South. In: Cassiolato, J., Lastres, H. and Maciel, M. (eds.) Systems of Innovation and Development, Edward Elgar Publishing.

Brundenius, C.; Göransson, B. and Ågren, J. 2008. The Role of Academic Institutions in the National System of Innovation in Sweden. UniDev Discussion Paper No. 6.

Brundenius, C. and Göransson, B. 2009. The UniDev Project: A Synthesis of Main Results, UniDev Discussion Paper (forthcoming).

Hirschman, A. 1981. Essays in Trespassing. Economics to Politics and Beyond. Cambridge,

Cambridge University Press (CUP).

Mann, M. 1993. The Sources of Social Power, Volume II, New York, Cambridge University Press (CUP).

Rogers, E.M. 1995. Diffusion of Innovations, New York: Fourth edition, Free Press.

4.



Sen, A. 2000. Social Exclusion: Concept, Application and Scrutiny. Social Development Papers No. 1. Office of Environment and Social Development, Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Vérez-Bencomo, V. et al., 2004. A Synthetic Conjugate Polysaccaride Vaccine against Haemophilus Influenza Type b. In: Science, Vol. 305. 23 July.

Ziman, J. 1994. Prometheus Bound. Science in a Dynamic Steady State. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press (CUP).

______. 2000. Real Science. What it is, and What it Means. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press (CUP).

Contact details:

Professor Claes Brundenius, Research Policy Institute (RPI)Lund UniversityBox 117, 221 00Lund, Swedene-mail: [email protected].



Chapter �Innovative public policy to link science with development: Bolivarian University of Venezuela (UBV)

Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona, María Cristina Parra-Sandoval, Alicia Inciarte González and Amalia Bohórquez,

Venezuela

1. IntroductionSince 1998, the Venezuelan State has undertaken a set of measures intended to break with the institutional framework existing in the country since 1958, including, in this process, Higher Education (HE). Such changes have a political basis in, among others, the theory of endogenous and sustainable development or development from within (Sunkel, 1995). Endogenous development, according to the National Plan for Science, Technology and Innovation 2005-2030 is a model of integrated development which values the people’s own realities and capacities, with an emphasis on communities, local areas and actual conditions. This meets the criteria of making use of local advantages and community leadership to achieve the implementation of the model (Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela, Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Ciencia, la Tecnología y la Innovación, 2005).

The National Constitution approved in 1999, established Higher Education as a priority strategic area. In 2003, the Venezuelan Government created a new university Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela (UBV) inspired by a model which listed among its most important principles those of public responsibility, social equity, participative democracy, quality and innovation, social relevance, critical thought, humanitarian education, ethics and lifelong learning. This new university model was to be oriented towards making a contribution to sustainable knowledge and endogenous development.

Based on such principles, the new university appears fundamentally different in concept and internal dynamic from pre-existing universities in Venezuela. While the latter are concerned with scientific knowledge production which is part of mainstream scientific standards, the UBV works with un-systematized social knowledge that constitutes part of more complex social practices, carried out by those outside academia (participants in social movements, indigenous ethnic groups). It explores ancestral ‘knowings’ or instinctive knowledge, rejected by conventional universities as ‘impure’ or ‘hybrid’.

An example of innovative pedagogical practice at the new university is the community project, which functions as a bridge between education and research, providing an integrated vision ‘from, with and for’ the community. In fact, the UBV Project involves in its curricular unit more than 400,000 students and their professors carrying out investigations, and solving problems in the country’s communities during the four years of training years, and spreading the political message of the Venezuelan Government.

On the other hand, UBV is developing what they call ‘the university-going-to-the-village model’ whereby HE is offered in small and distant villages where people would otherwise

Chapter 4 Innovative public policy to link science with development: Bolivarian university of Venezuela (BUV)


never have the opportunity to study at a university. This practice should improve the development of the country’s marginal areas.

The present pattern followed by UBV and several universities in the South aims to transform the so-called developmental universities into becoming the main source of knowledge production for their countries. (Sutz, 2006; Arocena et al., 2008; Juma, 2006; Delali, 2008). This study deals with two consequences of such a tendency: first, the conflict with or lack of suitability of the Science and Technology (S&T) indicators applied in the main stream of science for evaluating universities in the South and, second, the risk involved in such a tendency which, it will be argued, are tantamount to the ‘trivialization’ of Higher Education.

2. One state policy for higher education: Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela (UBV)

In 1958, the democratic process began in Venezuela with the fall of the military dictatorship that had controlled the country for a decade. The political system established at that time was that of a representative democracy whose objectives of favouring social equality and institutional modernization produced, as one of their positive effects, the consolidation of middle professional levels and the establishment of HE as a mechanism for social ascent. This was evidenced in a more than 100 per cent increase in HE registration from 1975 to 1995 (CINDA, 2007). However, this increase was not enough to fulfill the entire demand for participating in university education. In 1998, the APR (Age Participation Rate) was less than 36 per cent, placing the country below the percentage conventionally accepted as indicating a medium massification level (between 36 per cent and 45 per cent APR). This meant that two-thirds of the population i.e. more than 64 per cent were excluded (CINDA, 2007). In 1998, a total of 259,340 high-school graduates sought admittance to HE: the National University Council gave places to 16,552, representing only 6 per cent of the total demand (D’Elia, et al., 2006).

In 1998, the current Government came into power; from its inception, it proposed the reorganization of institutions and a new legal and administrative structure. The goal of these public policies is endogenous development based on a change in the country’s productive system, so that each region will be able to transform its natural resources into goods and services that expand employment opportunities and social well-being, and guarantee the quality of life for people and the environment, without affecting the development capacity of future generations.

This implied that, in line with institutional reorganization and to advance the success of the revolutionary and socialist political process, the Venezuelan Higher Education system sought to overcome their characteristic weaknesses and failings, which were considered genuine obstacles to achieving endogenous development. These obstacles were expressed in several features: the exclusion of less economically favoured sectors, such as populations living in communities far from large cities; the ignorance in universities of ‘other knowings’ which go hand in hand with the demand for socially useful science and knowledge; and professional training which has little or no impact on the local or the regional.


In view of these circumstances and taking advantage of the growing resources derived from the high price of oil, the national government decided to create the Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela (UBV) as an alternative university able to meet the demand for human resources that the government required to work at the different levels or in the organizations that were to promote its political project.

3. The main goal of the research projectThe research whose partial results are presented in this paper arose from a discussion concerning to what extent the Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela (UBV) represented a suitable state policy that would break with the traditional Higher Education model, in order to incorporate effectively in universities the endogenous and sustainable development that the knowledge society and the new social and political reality required.

The project has as its central goal the aim of describing the UBV model as a new form of university in the South and examining whether there actually are differences between the UBV and the pre-existent university model represented in Venezuela by the public universities.

The aim of this contribution is, first, to sketch the main features that the UBV model introduces to break the prevalent university model in Venezuela; second, to provide an overview of how the UBV contributes to the production and distribution of knowledge, of which a key factor is to promote development; third, to address the most recent controversies suggested by the notion of developmental universities.

4. Methodological issuesThe project case study included four (4) national universities:

Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV) [Central University of Venezuela].

Universidad del Zulia (LUZ) [University of Zulia].

Universidad Simón Bolívar (USB) [Simon Bolivar University] and,

Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela (UBV) [Bolivarian University of Venezuela].

Table 1. Universites selected

Name AcronymYear

FoundedEnrolment

2008

UniversidadcentraldeVenezuela UCV 1771 46.489

UniversidaddelZulia LUZ 1891 52.975

Universidadexperimental‘SimonBolivar’ USB 1967 9.277

UniversidadBolivarianadeVenezuela UBV 2003 191.378

Source: Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona, et al.,

••••



The selection of these universities was based on the fact that the UCV and LUZ are the largest and oldest official, autonomous universities in the country, while the USB is official but experimental. These three are institutions that all emphasize scientific research plus training in their mission. The selected institutions are outstanding in Venezuela, if the quality of graduates, research budgets, publications and other conventional Higher Education indicators are compared on a national level.

The research makes use of quantitative and qualitative techniques to collect data. The quantitative techniques use some conventional indicators exhibited in Table 2.

The qualitative strategies are based on:

Content analysis of official university documents.

Ten focus groups with university students, and

Twenty-three in-depth interviews with university academic staff and Government officials of HE and S&T sectors.

This qualitative data is crucial to the present project, due to the fact that the quantitative indicators proved to be insufficient for clearly designating the UBV model, though the qualitative data is still in process.

In an initial methodological approach a dual subject/object approach was used. Consequently, the same analytic-conceptual categories were applied to all the universities selected, in order to ‘homogenize’ the academic-educational dynamics and their results, using concepts belonging to an epistemological and axiological rationality unrelated to the UBV, although we had perceived that the academic practices and logic of this university and the other universities were irreconcilable to common variables and the classic indicators applied to HE. Using such a methodology the project would have produced conclusive results, but those results would have been confusing, since the emergence of another university model for the Southern developing countries implies the creation of innovative comprehensive concepts different from those that have been applied to research in Higher Education until now.

Therefore, a shift was introduced in the methodology in order to design and develop a theoretical research model that makes it possible to think about, to discuss, and to produce theories and analyses which refer meaningfully to two separate entities: that of the Bolivarian University of Venezuela and that of the pre-existent universities in the country. This toolbox – the theoretical model – built as a project outcome consists of four thematic axes, each of them consisting of essential aspects and discernment keys which provide us with alternative analytical concepts for defining and contrasting different models of universities and knowledge production systems. It is important to state that, from our current epistemological position (developed from interaction with the UBV and the rest of the universities in the study) we accepted and expected the possibility that new conceptual elements might arise that we had not considered in this systematization.

•••


Table 2. Thematic axes and quantitative indicators

Thematic axes Quantitative indicators

Knowledgeproduction • Numberofpeerreviewedscientificjournals.

• Numberofextensionprojects

• Numberofresearchprojects

• Numberofcommunityserviceprojects

• Numberofuniversity–externalsectoragreements.

• Numberofuniversitycompanies.

• NumberofresearchprojectsfinancedbyLOCTI.*

• Numberofresearchunits(institutes,centres,lines)

• Seatsornucleiattheuniversities.

• Professorsaccreditedintheprogrammeforpromotingtheresearcher.**

• Numberofpatentsregisteredbytheuniversity

Universityconcept • Distributionofuniversitybudget,ingeneralandbyfunctions.

• Universityregistrationinthelastfiveyears.

• Professorsaccreditedtotheprogrammeforpromotingtheresearcher.

• Numberandfeaturesofundergraduatesprogrammes(Conventionalorinnovative).

• Numberofgraduateprogrammes(specialisation,master’sanddoctoratedegrees)

Relationoftheuniversitytoitssurroundingsforknowledgeproduction

• Numberofextensionprojects.


• Numberofuniversity–externalsectoragreements.

• Numberofuniversitycompanies.

• Seatsornucleiattheuniversities.

• Universityregistrationinthelastfiveyears.

Universityactors • Universityregistrationinthelastfiveyears.

• Studententryateachuniversity.


• Numberofgraduatesinthelastfiveyears.

Source: Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona et al.,

*LOCTI: This law published in the Official Gazette Nº 38242 dated August 3, 2005, introduces mechanisms for the business sector to contribute and to invest resources in research and development activities, technology transfer and the training of national human talent.

** Programme for Promotion of the researcher or PPI (according to its Spanish abbreviation). From 1990 on, the Venezuelan State implemented an evaluation policy for national researchers to improve research in the country, allocating grants to selected researchers according to their research outputs.



5. Theoretical research model: an alternative set of indicators to define and to map knowledge production systems and actors in the universities of developing countries

Table 3. Theoretical research model

Thematic axes Essential aspects Discernment keys

Knowledge production

Scientificresearch

Formativeresearch

Technologicalinnovationandsocialappropriationofknowledge

Knowledgeproductionmodel

Knowledgeinsertedintoreality

Spacesforknowledgeproduction

Competentactorsforknowledgeproduction

Relationofuniversitypracticestothenationalprojectforscienceandtechnologyandothercrucialstateplans

Destinationfortheresearchresults

University concept Socialfunctionoftheuniversity

Orientationoftheuniversity:

• Professionalising

• Scientificknowledgeproducer

• Entrepreneurial

• Developmentoriented

• Socialist

Academic-organizationalstructureforknowledgeproduction

Formsofgovernmentanddecisionmakingwithintheuniversity

Academicadministrativeorganizationforteaching,researchandextension

Trainingmodel

Relation of the university to its environment for knowledge production.

Practicesofuniversity/environmentrelationship:

• Government

• Communities

• Communalcouncils

• Privateorganizations

• Educationalsector

Practicesoftheuniversity-environmentrelationship

• Communityserviceprojects

• Locationoftheuniversity

University actors Students

Professors

Graduates

Community

Studentadmissionandmonitoringsystem

Studentparticipationincommunityandknowledgeproductionprojects

Identificationwiththeuniversityproject

Professorialadmission/hiringsystem

Professorialpermanenceandpromotionsystem

Professorialtrainingsystem

Graduatesaccordingtoknowledgearea.

Sources: Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona et al.,


6. Bolivarian University of Venezuela (UBV): recognizes and accredits a diversity of ‘knowings’ and not only or exclusively knowledge-sanctioned as scientific, or true, by academic, disciplinary and scientific conventional patterns

In Latin America and Africa new performers are participating in knowledge production activities; working with communities, ethnic groups, and indigenous people (not only consultancies or NGO but ordinary people). This ‘third sector’ of knowledge production, as it was called during the UNESCO Global Research Seminar (Paris, November 2008), produces an alternative knowledge less systematized than conventional scientific knowledge but based upon People-centred developmental needs research (PCDNR) as it is called by Dovie Delali (2008). The above mentioned theoretical model includes as “competent actors for knowledge production”: those involved in the knowledge production process: professors, students, community members, graduates, and community leaders.

The Bolivarian University of Venezuela recognizes and accredits a diversity of ‘knowings’, not only or exclusively, knowledge sanctioned as scientific or true by academic, disciplinary and institutional traditions. Universities form part of what Michel Foucault (1992) qualifies as the regime of power/knowledge/truth for each society, because they constitute the space that produces, reproduces, legitimates and disseminates knowledge/discourse sanctioned as the true kind and, consequently, excluding and discriminating against discourses and practices branded as meta-scientific, fallacious and false. Through the accreditation process, universities have established only one type of knowledge as true: the ‘scientific’. Bestowal of a university degree legitimates the discourse of its bearer and places him/her in a power-knowledge relationship which invests him/her with authority in the eyes of one who does not take part in the procedures, rules and techniques belonging to that type of knowledge.

The UBV recognizes and incorporates in its training processes a dialogue with other ‘knowings’ through a dynamic, dialectic process of participation and interaction with the popular sectors to transform reality, together with students and teachers via the community project. This constitutes a strategy for approaching what is real in order to appropriate it and translate it into novel initiatives for social action. In doing so, this university recovers meanings constructed in and from the community (popular knowledge).

However, the ‘outputs’ or advances, to which the recognition and incorporation of this type of ‘knowings’ leads, are not destined for publication in scientific journals or for entering the flow of the scientific mainstream, because the demands of academic systematization lack logic, being orientated, on the other hand, toward the fulfillment of PCDNR. The UBV graduate is not trained in the scientific codes of objectivity and evaluation but, rather, is a professional who, indifferent to the traditional systems of scientific references, assumes the axiomatic non-neutrality of daily, popular and community ‘knowings’ in a dialectic whose potential for recognition cannot be measured by the classic indicators applied to scientific knowledge.



7. Community project: interrelation between training, contextualized research and the community.

At the UBV, research activity is integrated into the training process through the curricular unit called ‘project’, which represents one of the innovative elements in the dynamic of this university, because it links the training-research processes with the community, its problems and efforts to overcome them.

The UBV ‘project’ is a practice with a curiosity-based, proposal-orientated approach conceived as “a basic integrating unit organised in terms of axes and curricular units to put into practice the interrelation of types of knowledge based on a social problem and using a collective and participative research process” (Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela, 2007). It develops from the beginning of the training process until graduation, through direct action in the communities, completing work phases that include the approach, diagnosis, exchange and integration of academic knowledge and popular ‘knowing’; community actors intervene in a dialogue that constructs experience, learning and integration. These community actors not only have responsibilities in the design and execution of the ‘project’, but also participate in evaluating the students, and together with them, build up an evaluative attitude about the historical moment they are experiencing, in terms of a socio-political vision through which they define themselves as transforming agents through research practice, integration and development as citizens.

The UBV ‘project’ has further effects, such as, the:

Student advances in his/her career.

Solution to the key problem that concerns them is constructed.

Graduate’s skills are put into practice.

Socio-political programme that furthers the UBV is developed.

The UBV considers that the ‘project’ cannot be understood as a common curricular unit; the university defines it as “the key element to transform and build our educational policy and to construct from its basis a new vision for the country” (Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela,2008a), because it will allow the implementation of other more effective and open modes of study, modes orientated towards the inclusion of the population in higher education and in the social, cultural and political contextualization of university education.

The UBV project integrates the functions of training (teaching), research (knowledge production) and extension (insertion in the context of community development) in such a way that each student at this university has to initiate and develop a project necessarily linked to the problems of the community or the context in which the individual or the university itself is located.

A feature of the UBV project is that it supports the emergence of a new university model in Venezuela, distinct from that of the pre-existent universities. Documents generated by the university express the view that “advance of the project as a means of breaking away from the traditional university is a politically correct reading of our times” (Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela, 2008b: 25).

••••


Scientific research, whose sine qua non is to promote knowledge production indissolubly linked to humanistic, social or technological innovation, is not a defining characteristic of the UBV’s community ‘project’. This absence is more obvious in the university villages (See Infra, Nº 7: “University going to the villages or Municipalisation of Higher Education”), administered by the UBV in 276 of the 335 municipalities throughout the country, because in most of these locations, appropriate installations, such as laboratories, equipment, infrastructure, supplies or highly qualified staff (teachers/researchers) who train students in the activity of producing innovative science, do not exist, even in small numbers.

On the other hand, research leading to scientific and technological innovation demands a significant budget that is not reflected in the budgetary distribution of the UBV. It can be observed that the UBV takes care of a much greater number of students with one-third of the budget used by the rest of the universities. This proportion makes it impossible for the UBV to attract sufficient resources for innovative scientific and technological research.

Graph 1. Universities registration 2007

Sources: Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona et al.,

Graph 2. Universities budget 2007

Sources: Ana Julia Bozo de Carmona, et al.,

61.805

47.593

11.436

182.265

0

20.000

40.000

60.000

80.000

100.000

120.000

140.000

160.000

180.000

200.000

UNIVERSITIES

LUZ

UCV

USB

UBV

522.150

711.887

250.389

169.129

0

100.000

200.000

300.000

400.000

500.000

600.000

700.000

800.000

BsF

UNIVERSITIES

LUZ

UCV

USB

UBV



Nevertheless, it is important to emphasise that the research performed at the UBV through the community project has developed the capacity to incorporate daily life and its actors as co-authors in the processes of investigation and transformation of the same. “When we refer to ‘daily life’ we are thinking about issues associated with health, nutrition, habitat, transportation, communications, ways of learning, available information, modes of participation to which there is access. In general terms, for the researchers, it is not easy to incorporate these issues from the direct perspective of the people ... The distance between daily life and the reality of research is great and applications derived from knowledge production will have more probabilities of occurring the closer the researcher is to the user” (Arocena, et al., 2008: pp.135-136).

8. University going to the villages or municipalisation of higher education

The municipalisation of higher education is a governmental innovative strategy that has allowed the university to draw near to the people and offer opportunities for higher studies in all jurisdictions of the country, from municipalities located in the interior to the great cities, from rural and outlying municipalities located in remote areas and even in zones that are cut off from the rest of the national territory. This policy has been executed through the Sucre Mission whose concrete expression is the creation and functioning of ‘University Villages’ in more than 90 per cent of the municipalities that make up the national geography, making it possible for hundreds of thousands of youth and adults, previously excluded from universities, to have access to higher education today. Most of the ‘University Villages’ are administered academically by the UBV, and the rest by other public universities. In practice, the villages are municipal centres where training programmes from different institutions amalgamate, sharing academic resources: professors; consulting, meeting and discussion spaces; laboratories; information and documentation centres; practice centres; and cultural, sports and production activities (Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela. Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación Superior, s/f).

Table 4. University villages registered with the Sucre Mission

University villages Nº.

Builtbetween2005and2006 33

Builtin2007 8

Builtin2008 13

Underconstruction 26

Inalternativespaces:localareasforalternativeuniversityeducationthatwerenotbuiltbytheSucreMission.

1764

Total 1844

Source: Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela.Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación Superior (2008).


These villages are made up of professors and students that follow the training programmes in the working installations existing in the town or the settlement (normally, belonging to basic education public schools) or in ad hoc installations built and endowed precisely for that purpose. They function on Saturdays, Sundays and weekdays on schedules different from working hours. Those training programmes lead to obtaining a degree conferred by the universities that are academically responsible for them. The UBV is responsible for offering opportunities for study and bestowing degrees for the programmes described in Table 5.

Table 5. Programme, enrolment and degrees bestowed by the UBV through the Sucre Mission, University villages

Programme Enrolment (Students who attended in 2008)

Degree bestowed**

TeacherTraining 234,100 Fulluniversityundergraduatedegree

LegalStudies 66,821 Fulluniversityundergraduatedegree

SocialManagementforLocalDevelopment 40,678 HigherTechnician(TSU)andFulluniversityundergraduatedegree

IntegralCommunityMedicine 20,578 IntegralCommunityMedicalProfessional

EnvironmentalManagement 20,103 HigherTechnicianandFulluniversityundergraduatedegree

SocialCommunication(Media) 13,099 HigherTechnicianandFulluniversityundergraduatedegree

Hydrocarbons 4,659 HigherTechnician

** Full university undergraduate degree corresponds to Bachelor’s degree in USA; in Venezuela it traditionally implies five years of university studies. Higher Technician (TSU) is usually a three-year degree.Source: Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela. Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación Superior (2008)

The process of municipalising Higher Education has generated a significant impact and social mobilisation among population groups that live segregated from any educational activity. As can be observed in Table 6, there is significant participation of students from less economically favoured social classes, as well as from citizens of diverse ages who due to their circumstances, had been prevented from obtaining a place in HE.



Table 6. Impact of the Sucre Mission

Age group of the beneficiaries (Percentage of persons)

Average ages of the beneficiaries

Socio-economic groups (Percentage of persons)

Gender of the beneficiaries (Percentage of persons)

From10to17years 4.1 MinimumAge 18 IncomeQuartileI 19.9Male 30,8

From18to30years 61.1AverageAge 28

IncomeQuartileII 25.2

From31to50years 33.4 IncomeQuartileIII 32.3

Female 69,2From51yearsandabove 1.4

MaximumAge 66IncomeQuartileIV 22.6

TOTAL 100 TOTAL 100 TOTAL 100

Source: Venegas and Yáñez, 2007.

The municipalities process of higher education is unanimously perceived as an exceptional opportunity for the beneficiaries and has generated significant social mobilization among population groups who were segregated from any educational activity. However, true – as it is – that the educational dynamics produced by municipalisation have generated processes of personal development, of raising self-esteem, of civic interaction and community development, which is not insignificant, it is no less true that the acquisition of professional competencies and intellectual skills to produce or reproduce knowledge is highly compromised by the practice of municipalisation. This is for two reasons: one, the teachers are the few graduates who live in the town and receive a short course to turn them into university professors and, two, the lack of documentary references, or bibliographic material and the lack of access to the new technologies that could remedy that lack .

9. Developmental universities: opportunity or obstacle for the South?

The Bolivarian University of Venezuela, as well as most universities in Africa (Delali, 2008; Juma, 2008) and other Southern contexts seems to represent the model called ‘Developmental Universities’. This paper presents an assessment of such a model which reflects the approach of our project and the practices of the universities different from the so• called macro-universities in Latin America.

Our concept is inspired by the work of Judith Sutz (2006) and others (Arocena, Bortagaray and Sutz, 2008): She argued that a ‘Developmental University’ is concerned with knowledge production in order to achieve environmental sustainability and the improvement of the quality of human life through either the research performed to the standards of the scientific mainstream or through a research approach which incorporates daily ‘knowings’ and dialogues with extra-academic actors.

This concept includes, as a key factor of knowledge production, a model of a university different from those orientated to the production of conventional scientific research, thus


opening the Higher Education system to the notion of ‘unidiversity’ (university diversity). (Sobrinho, 2008).

Nevertheless a tension exists between developmental universities and the phenomenon we have called ‘trivialization’ of Higher Education. To promote developmental universities as the model for the Higher Education system for developing countries, we must previously enquire whether and in what measure those development-oriented universities are committed to innovation and advanced scientific research. We should also enquire whether they are improving the quality of life and inclusion. Are they, in fact, perpetuating technological dependence that deepens the gap between the developed North and the ‘developing’ South?

The trivialization of HE involves a dangerous risk. By trivialization, we understand a process of diminishing university education that produces two phenomena: one, the massive bestowal of degrees that do not reflect sufficient preparation for performing a job with a high intellectual demand and do not generate scientific-technological innovations, and two, the multiplication of insufficiently trained professionals as a consequence of an improvised proliferation of universities whose missions, purposes and functions are different from those based on strictly scientific knowledge production.

10. Conflict or lack of suitability of the science and technology indicators corresponding to the main scientific stream for evaluating the higher education institutions of the South

The indicators currently in use, such as publication in high impact journals, international science prizes bestowed on scholars of each institution, patents, top rankings etc. reflect the status and logic belonging to universities conceived as centres of advanced knowledge production. They respond to the international scientific agenda that identifies, as a priority, problems belonging to the developed North but these are distant from the developing South. They are incompatible with a university linked to contextual problems in these countries, with the recognition of daily ‘knowings’ and with the incorporation of extra-university actors in the task of learning and re-creating knowledge.

The challenge for our countries is to find the way to guarantee the rigour and validity of knowledge produced in the South based on the construction of indicators that will withstand the same rigour and validity as the indicators of the North, but at the same time, will recognize the wealth of cultural diversity and “popular wisdom.” For this, reference does not necessarily have to be to western science but rather the measure by which the knowledge produced in this way contributes to development.

The theoretical model proposed in this study attempts to overcome the “tyranny of indicators: insufficiency of the existing set of indicators to describe the diversity of research outputs that are necessary for robust research systems” (Jacob, 2008) through a model which presents and represents the whole set of innovative practices that are being constructed in developing countries.

Other paths are possible.



ReferencesArocena, R.; Bortagaray, I. y Sutz, J. 2008. Reforma Universitaria y Desarrollo. Uruguay:

Tradinco.

Centro Interuniversitario de Desarrollo (CINDA). 2007. Educación Superior en Iberoamérica. Informe 2007. Chile. In: http://www.cinda.cl/download/informe_educacion_superior_iberoamericana_2007.pdf [Consulted 19 September, 2008].

Delali, D. 2008. University Research and People-centred Developmental Needs in Ghana. IDRC Innovation Policy and Science Report: New Role of Universities in Growth and Development in the South; Developmental Universities of the South. First Ghana Seminar. May, 2008, University of Ghana, Legon.

D’Elia,Y. (Coordinadora), Torres, C.; Pérez, M.; Giménez, C.; Maingón, T.; Lacruz, T. and Torres, O. 2006. Las Misiones Sociales en Venezuela: Una aproximación a su comprensión y análisis. Caracas: Instituto Latinoamericano de Investigaciones Sociales (ILDIS). In: www.ildis.org.ve/website/administrador/uploads/DocumentoMisiones.pdf [Consulted 28 July, 2008].

Dias Sobrinho, J. 2008. Calidad, pertinencia y responsabilidad social de la universidad latinoamericana y caribeña. Capítulo 3. Tendencias de la Educación Superior en América Latina y el Caribe. Documento Base de la Conferencia Regional de Educación Superior de América Latina y el Caribe. IESALC-UNESCO. In: http://www.cres2008.org/common/docs/doc_base/CAPITULO per cent2003 per cent20Dias per cent20Sobrinho.doc

Foucault, M. 1992. La microfísica del poder. Madrid: Editorial Ediciones de la Piqueta.

Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela. Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Ciencia, la Tecnología y la Innovación (2005). Plan Nacional de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación 2005-2030. In: http://www.fonacit.gov.ve/documentos/pncti.pdf (Consulted 15 July, 2008).

______. Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación Superior (2008).La Revolución Bolivariana en La Educación Superior, Algunas Cifras Fundamentales. In: http://www.mes.gov.ve/mes/documentos/boletin/pdf17-10-2008_17:54:25.pdf (Consulted 23 November, 2008)

______. Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación Superior (s/f), Aldea Universitaria San Sebastián,, Web site Fund@sanse, Aragua. Coordinador: Prof. José Correa In: http://www.sansebastianeros.com/aldea/aldeasanse.html (Consulted July 27 2008).

Jacob, M. 2008. Problematising Global Research Systems. Final Report GRS UNESCO, Higher Education Forum. In: http://portal.unesco.org/education/es/files/58371/12284942665Final_Report.pdf/Final per cent2BReport.pdf

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http://www.ildis.org.ve/website/administrador/uploads

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Juma Calestous, Reinventing Africa Universities (2008) Falmer, The University of Sussex Magazine, Issue 44, pp. 8-10.

República Bolivariana de Venezuela 1999. Constitución Nacional. Gaceta Oficial Extraordinaria N° 5.453. Caracas, viernes 24 de marzo de 2000

Sunkel, O. 1995. El desarrollo desde adentro. Un enfoque neoestructuralista para América Latina. México: Fondo de Cultura Económica.

Sutz, Judith 2006. Developmental Universities: A Changing Role for Universities in the South. IDRC Call for Proposals by Research on Knowledge Systems (ROKS). Innovation, Policy and Sciences Program Area, Canada. In: http://www.idrc.ca/uploads/user-S/11461443851103470_CFP-Full_English.pdf

Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela 2007. Modelo Teórico Curricular y Programas de Formación de Grado en la UBV. Caracas: Comisión Coordinadora del Diseño Curricular.

______. 2008ª. UBV XXI. Voces Colectivas. Proyecto Como Medio Articulador Social y Eje de la Geometría del Poder In: http://www.ubv.edu.ve/ubvxxi/UBVXXI.pdf (Consulted, 25 October, 2008)

______. 2008b. Jornada de Reflexión UBV XXI, Momento II, Proyecto como eje articulador social y eje de la geometría del poder. Colección Cuadrenillos para el debate. Ed. Del Rectorado de la UBV, Caracas.

Venegas, M. y Yáñez, P. 2007. Las Misiones de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela y las Transformaciones de la Subjetividad. Ponencia presentada en el VIII Congreso de Psicología Social de la Liberación, Santiago de Chile; Lógicas de resistencia y transformación social. www.liber-accion.org/Joomla/index.php2option=com_docman&task (Consulted 30 July, 2008).

NB: This chapter has been prepared for the UNESCO Forum Global Research Seminar: Occasional Paper No.16. It presents the preliminary results of the IDRC Project Grant Number: 103470-011 entitled: “Bolivarian University of Venezuela: An Innovative Public Policy to Link Science with Development?”

http://www.idrc

http://www.ubv.edu.ve/ubvxxi/UBVXXI.pdf

http://www.liber-accion.org/Joomla/index



Contact details:

Ana Julia Bozo de CarmonaCoordinator of Postdoctoral Program on HigherEducation Management,Rafael Belloso Chacín University,Maracaibo,Venezuela.e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

María Cristina Parra-Sandoval,Universidad de Zulia,Maracaibo,Venezuela.e-Mail: [email protected]

Alicia Inciarte González,Universidad Del Zulia,Maracaibo,Venezuela.e-mail: [email protected]

Amalia Bohórquez,Health System,Zulia State Government,Venezuela.e-mail: [email protected]







Chapter �Universities in national development: Perspectives on a second academic revolution linked to a third industrial revolution.

David Cooper, South Africa

Introduction: ContextFor a number of years I have been tracking the development of eleven research groups at South African universities in the Western Cape1. This investigation has taken place in the new, post-1994 South Africa, which has moved from a closed to an open economy, from a state of siege to a constitutional democracy. These massive shifts have occurred in the context of what I term (see below) a global Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution, which has been unfolding since the 1970s. They take on a special character in South Africa given its legacy of racial division, deliberate class stratification and underdevelopment of certain sectors of society.

Science, technology, and innovation, linked to new forms of capital and labour, are becoming major drivers of international economic growth and well-being. In this context of global scaffolding of the South African research system, my research has, since 2000, focused on the role of ‘use-inspired research’ (also below) by universities in enhancing the socio-economic-cultural development of our society, i.e. my research has been mapping knowledge in relation to what might be termed the social responsiveness role of universities.

My analysis focuses on four sets of ideas, which I have found fundamental in facilitating an understanding of these eleven research groupings during the period 2000-2008. During nearly a decade of research tracing the trajectories of these eleven groupings, I have developed a number of theoretical perspectives – essentially ‘grounded theory’ linked to the analysis of the cases – in order to make sense of my data. Thus the discussion below concentrates on four central concepts, which emerged as valuable during the analysis phase:

Use-Inspired Basic Research.

Second Academic Revolution.

Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution, and

Fourth Helix.

It is important, nonetheless, to contextualize these concepts in this introduction by describing the nature of this research2.

1. Hence the subtitle of my forthcoming book (Cooper, 2009), “Case Studies of Research Groups at Universities of the Western Cape, South Africa”.

2. The first part of the forthcoming book discusses these and other concepts, and international trends in university research, in considerable detail; the second part undertakes a detailed analysis of each respective case study, followed by conclusions about general issues and trends pertaining to the case studies as a whole. Empirical findings emerging from the case study analysis are not the focus here; however, some preliminary findings up to the period 2004 can be found in Cooper (2005).

••••

Chapter 5 Universities in national development: perspectives on a second academic revolution linked to a third industrial revolution


My data collection methods have been based on rich case study data, derived from in-depth semi-structured interviews and document collection with respect to the eleven research groupings, spread across the universities in the Western Cape and including universities of technology3, and collected over a period of seven years from 2000. The mode of data collection is fairly unusual for qualitative case studies: the original interviews, with a director and some researchers of each research centre or unit, were undertaken in 2000 with my research funded by the Trade and Industrial Policy Secretariat (TIPS) of South Africa in association with the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada. Then, as part of a follow-up project funded by the Knowledge Systems Group of the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) of South Africa, each of the research centres/units was re-interviewed early in 2005, and again revisited for interviews and documentary updates early in 2007. This fascinating material, unlike most qualitative studies, thus provides a historical profile of the changing nature of these eleven research groupings over the period 2000-2005-2007 – showing how, usually quite unexpectedly, some research centres and units significantly enhanced their research activities, while others experienced serious problems. Moreover, this study across time provides valuable insight into the factors that are blocking (or sometimes enhancing) the development of use-inspired research at our South African universities.

I define ‘use-inspired’ research as a combination of what Donald Stokes (1997) terms ‘pure applied research’ (PAR) and ‘use-inspired basic research’ (UIBR), i.e. PAR+UIBR. It is pertinent to turn to the concept of UIBR, before exploring the other three central concepts that follow – though, as will be observed at the end, the four as a whole are interconnected and their meaning is constructed partly in relation to each other.

The idea of use-inspired basic research

The idea of use-inspired basic research (UIBR) from the work of Stokes (1997) has significantly influenced my own study.

Figure 1. Stokes’s quadrant model of scientific research.

Is the research inspired by considerations of use?

No Yes

Is the research inspired by a quest

for fundamental understanding?

YesPBR Pure Basic Research(exemplar: Niels Bohr)

UIBR Use-Inspired Basic Research (exemplar: Louis Pasteur)

NoPAR Pure Applied Research (exemplar: Thomas Edison)

Source: Adapted from Stokes, 1997: 73, Figure 3-5.

3. My investigation covered the three universities and two universities of technology (termed ‘technikons’ until 2004), of the Western Cape. Unless otherwise specified, I utilise the term ‘universities’ throughout to refer to both types of universities.


Essentially, Stokes argues that we need a concept of UIBR located between (or more accurately, in the top right quadrant) the traditional ideas of PBR (pure basic research, “the quest for understanding without concern for practical use”, 1997:73) and PAR (pure applied research, “extremely sophisticated, although narrowly targeted on immediate practical goals”, 1997:74). Stokes mentions the example of Louis Pasteur, whose work, he argues, was rooted in UIBR, “[which] includes basic research that seeks to extend the frontiers of understanding but is also inspired by considerations of use” (1997:74).

This idea of UIBR helped me to deal with a puzzle in relation to the eleven cases I was investigating. Only one case was selected as an illustration of pure basic research, or of what I termed ‘curiosity-oriented research’. The other ten were selected, at the start of the research in 2000, as an illustration of what I termed ‘application-oriented research’. However, as my research unfolded, I increasingly had to confront the fact that most of these ten selected research groups were not only undertaking applied research (PAR, in terms of Stokes’s definition) but also a form of research that, for want of a better term, I called ‘fundamental-applied’ (see Cooper, 2005 for an early use of this concept). This was because I observed that some of their research combined, in a complex unity, fundamental research work with applied work. Stumbling onto Stokes’s insightful work later in 2005 helped me enormously to crystallise these ideas around the concept of UIBR (a sharper concept than ‘fundamental-applied’). Moreover, the concept of UIBR also seemed much sharper and more useful than the idea of ‘strategic research’, which was in vogue in South Africa (and elsewhere) at the time. But most importantly, it helped me to begin to theorise another empirical finding, which had emerged from the data: that, especially at the research-intensive universities of the Western Cape (e.g. Universities of Cape Town and Stellenbosch), it was often UIBR that industry and government bodies sought most from research centres/units located at the universities, while industrial and other external organizations primarily sought PAR from the two Universities of Technology (Cape Technikon and Peninsula Technikon in 2000)4.This suggested that what was most valued especially by industry, with respect to research-intensive universities, was not applied research in general but, more specifically, Use-Inspired Basic Research. But this merely opened up a further puzzling question: what was happening in South Africa, and internationally, which was creating a much greater interest in the ‘output’ of UIBR from our universities, especially those with internationally-rated researchers?

The idea of a second academic revolution

Part of the answer to the latter question, I would argue, can be inferred from the idea of a post-1970s Second Academic Revolution – a concept that is derived from the work of Henry Etzkowitz and others (e.g. Etzkowitz, 2002, Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff, 1999)5. In essence, Etzkowitz suggests that we are seeing internationally at universities (including, I argue, in South Africa) a significant emergence of a 3rd Mission of universities: a mission to contribute to the socio-economic development of society. Furthermore, he argues that in

4. As noted earlier, by 2004 the technikons throughout South Africa had been renamed ‘universities of technology’; in the Western Cape, moreover, these two technikons merged into CPUT, the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, after 2005 – with a dichotomy emerging between research-intensive universities centred on UIBR and universities of technology centered on PAR.

5. In my own work (2009), I raise a set of problems and issues with respect to the ideas and concepts of Etzkowitz and his colleagues, especially around the idea of the Triple Helix and also the extent and uniformity of the Second Academic Revolution globally. Nonetheless, as is argued here, the fruitfulness of the latter concept in particular, is not disputed.



the nineteenth century we saw the emergence of a First Academic Revolution, which linked the earlier (feudal) 1st Mission of teaching to a new 2nd Mission of research (focusing on PBR, I would add). And now, since the last quarter of the twentieth century, he argues that we have been witnessing the emergence of a Second Academic Revolution in universities globally – in other words, the addition to the 1st/2nd Missions, of a new 3rd Mission, research contributing to societal development. I would assert moreover, that this new 3rd Mission is itself a combination of UIBR+PAR, i.e. what I have defined as ‘use-inspired research’, with varying mixtures of UIBR and PAR, depending on the context.

Importantly with regard to my study, the empirical data from the eleven cases strongly supports the hypothesis of such a Second Academic Revolution: our Western Cape universities are showing evidence of an increasing orientation towards use-inspired research since the 1980s, albeit in complicated and diverse ways. Moreover, ‘clients’ for this research are coming mainly from industry and national government. In addition, my data suggests that the 3rd Mission at our universities is very strongly supported by industry funding in South Africa (even more strongly, relatively speaking, than at universities in the USA and Europe); national government funding still provides around 60 per cent of expenditure in South Africa of Higher Education Research and Development (HERD, see Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD] 2007:92), but such government funding (compared to industry) is proportionately weaker than in OECD Member countries (OECD 2007:192)6. This suggests also that core funding for South African university research by government is insufficient, leading to much fragility and fracturing of the research enterprises of the eleven research groupings, which I investigated. In other words, at our South African universities over the past three decades we have certainly seen a mushrooming of new forms of use-inspired research centres and units and so-called ‘centres/networks of excellence’, oriented towards a 3rd Mission of socioeconomic development. But most research groups suffer from ‘chaos alongside their creativity’ (Cooper, 2001), with the lack of sufficient funding, especially from government, a major factor in effecting such relative ‘chaos’.

The above discussion leads to a further question: if there has been a significant rise in the ‘weight’ of the 3rd Mission at universities globally as well as in South Africa during the last quarter of the twentieth century, and if this has also been linked to a rise in the relative importance of industry funding for university research, why has such a shift occurred? In relation to the empirical data from the Western Cape case studies, and with regard to data of university trends internationally pertaining to the expansion of a 3rd Mission, I suggest that an important part of the answer relates to the emergence of a Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution since the 1970s7.

6. In my book (2009) I analyse how evidence suggests a general rise, after the 1970s, in the proportion of industry-based funding (i.e. the proportion of industry funding of HERD) for research-intensive universities in the USA and Europe (though even more strongly in South Africa), linked also to the increase in forms of university research based on research centres and units and ‘centres/networks of excellence’.

7. The empirical evidence for the expansion, internationally, of the 3rd Mission at universities and of (i) the parallel rise of industry funding as a proportion of expenditure within HERD and (ii) the concomitant mushrooming of new forms of university research centres and units and centres/networks of excellence involved in use-inspired research internationally, is discussed in the first part of my book (Cooper 2009). Here the focus is only on the theoretical element, viz. the emergence of a Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution in the last quarter of the twentieth century.


The idea of a third capitalist industrial revolution

My perspective here derives from diverse sociological theories of globalization. I argue that the post-1970s global Second Academic Revolution is itself linked to what I term a Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution8.

I view this Third Industrial Revolution, as impelled by Transnational Corporations (TNCs and their networks), as a new form of economic organization9. These new socio-economic relations of production are symbiotically linked to new cutting-edge technologies like ICT and biotechnology (part of the new, post-1970s ‘technological regime’, Figure 2), which are inconceivable without university-based research. The new industrial revolution is itself therefore closely linked to the Second Academic Revolution at universities: this post-1970s industrial transformation is impossible without a ‘knowledge society’ in which university-based research plays a vital role. For example, the new PCs and cell-phones are impossible without modern university-based physics and its theories of electronics, and the new biotechnology is rooted in genetic theories of DNA derived from universities’ PBR (and similarly for the new material science and nanoscience, shown in Figure 2). This is unlike the First Industrial Revolution, where new inventions (e.g. textiles, steam) were based around ‘practical men’ outside universities. It is also unlike the Second Industrial Revolution where new developments in electricity and chemicals were, at times, linked to university laboratories, but where nonetheless (i) these discoveries were rooted in PAR and not shaped by fundamental theory-based research (i.e. PBR and UIBR); and (ii) other factors (besides university knowledge) were more important in shaping this (Second) industrial revolution e.g. the rise of joint stock companies in manufacturing to facilitate the transition from family firm to national corporation, the role of the colonies in providing Europe with raw materials, new forms of semi-skilled production systems like ‘Fordism’ etc. For this reason, the First Academic Revolution in Figure 2 is not directly linked to either the First or the Second Industrial Revolution: this academic revolution thus sits ‘uneasily’ between these two industrial revolutions. Admittedly, science increasingly became linked to the later phases of the Second Industrial Revolution (e.g. with respect to aircraft technology, synthetic materials, in Figure 2), but never as centrally as is the case in the Third Industrial Revolution, where the ‘knowledge-society’ and university PBR and UIBR (i.e. the Second Academic Revolution) are absolutely central factors in the industrial transformation after the 1970s.

8. In my construction of Figure 2, I have used the analysis by Dicken (2003: 88) of a series of fifty-year economic growth cycles (1780-1830-1880-1930-1980), known to economists as Kondratiev long-waves, but I have ‘joined up’ each pair of 50 year cycles, making three nodes with ‘very long’ – 100 year – waves. I refer to each of these nodes or ‘moments’ as First, Second and Third capitalist industrial revolutions. These revolutions are each crucially shaped by what I term different ‘capitalist forms of economic organization’, namely the small family firm, the national share-holding corporation, and the transnational corporation-cum-networks – again as shown in Figure 2. I have found Dicken’s technological descriptions (2003: 87–89) for each Kondratiev cycle to be valuable, and the most important technologies listed by him for each period have been included in Figure 2.

9. See especially Dicken (2003: 238-273) for a discussion of TNCs and how they are linked to a complex network of smaller firms – what he calls ‘webs of enterprise: the geography of transnational production networks’.



Figure 2. Capitalist very long-waves; comprising sets of technological forces and socio-economic relations of production;

Capitalist industrial revolution

Major technologies (‘technological regime’)

Capitalist form of economic organization

First (1770s/1780s) (led by Britain)

Initially textile machinery, iron working, water power, pottery, etc.Later (from 1830s) steam engines, railways, etc.

Small family firm

First academic revolution(early 1800s till early 1900s)

Second (1870s/1880s) (led by Germany)

Initially electricity, chemicals, steel, etc. Later (from 1920s) automobiles, aircraft, synthetic materials etc.

National share-holding corporation

Third (1970s/1980s) (led by USA)

Initially ICT, biotechnology, optical fibres, material science, nanotechnology, etc.Later ?

Transnational corporation-cum-networks

Second academic revolution(takes off from 1980s)

In essence, therefore, this idea of a Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution, which is embedded in Figure 2, implies that university PBR and UIBR have been, and will be in future, indispensable for the unfolding of this global industrial transformation since the 1970s. The new, post-1970s ‘knowledge-society’ is therefore viewed as an important breakpoint (a ‘revolution’) in relation to the earlier modern societies. In addition, the universities are given a central place here: the Second Academic Revolution and its associated 3rd Mission of the role of the university in socio-economic development, is symbiotically linked to the Third Industrial Revolution. In addition, the category of ‘capitalist’ is important: implicitly here, there is a functionalist explanation, namely, that in the late 1960s/early 1970s, there was a general slowdown in the global economy; in order to ‘lift out’ of this downturn, a new form of economic organization (transnational corporation-cum-networks) became consolidated from the 1970s/80s. At the same time, these TNCs increasingly sought profitability by turning to universities for their PBR and UIBR, in order to facilitate the development of innovative products (based especially on ICT and biotechnology, initially) for their global markets10.

10. This ‘functionalist’ argument is discussed more fully in Cooper (2009).


The idea of a global Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution provided, moreover, new ways of looking at the Western Cape case studies of research groups within my study. On the one hand, it provided new insights into why there has been such significant mushrooming of new research centres and units and ‘centres/networks of excellence’ in universities and universities of technology of the Western Cape (and South Africa as a whole) since the 1980s/90s. On the other hand, it also provided insights into why the research missions of most of my eleven cases – of application-oriented research for socio-economic development, in other words, the 3rd Mission according to Etzkowitz - were so frequently oriented towards industry and sometimes national government as clients. I therefore found that what Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff (1999) term the Triple Helix of University-Industry-Government (U-I-G) research relationships, is alive and strong within the majority of my case studies. And this is surely linked in part to the impact on South Africa of the global Third Industrial Revolution, which fosters closer linkages with respect to U-I research relationships, with the latter themselves facilitated and co-ordinated by national government (G).

But this then posed a further question: why were research links of University research groups with Civil Society (CS) organizations – defined as local community and labour and women’s organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), provincial government and municipal bodies etc. – so much weaker than the Triple Helix U-I-G linkages? It was puzzling therefore why, amongst the eleven cases of Western Cape research groups, I found generally weak U-CS research links; only 2-3 cases demonstrated any significant research work for bodies outside the Triple Helix.

The (missing) idea of a fourth helix, of university-civil society linkages

When someone from the ‘third world’ like myself peruses international academic literature on research policy and science & technology studies, including leading journals such as “Research Policy” or “Science and Public Policy”, one is struck by an absence – a significant gap – in discussions of serious scholarly research work by academics in relation to links between universities and labour/civic/community organizations. Many articles, in contrast, reflect what might be classified as an ‘innovation anxiety’: particularly dominant over the past two decades in the USA and Europe, it is associated with heightened global economic competition, with a resultant, almost exclusive, focus on how industry can become more innovative and how university and government might facilitate this. This links also to what appears to be the major discourse with respect to research policy, both internationally and increasingly in South Africa too: the discourse revolving around the idea of National Systems of Innovation (NSIs), and how Triple Helix research relationships need to be the central focus of national policy initiatives to enhance each country’s NSI (see, for example, Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff, 1999).

There thus seems to be relatively little reference to what I am calling the Fourth Helix, of University-Civil Society (U-CS) research relations. The concept of the Triple Helix in effect relegates the idea of the Fourth Helix to the periphery.



Figure 3. The ‘orphan’ U-CS link, alongside the U-I-G Triple Helix.

Interestingly, when debate about a possible Fourth Helix emerged quite explicitly at the Fifth Triple Helix Conference of 2005 (in Turin)11, Etzkowitz and Zhou (2006) in their article a year later did acknowledge that “various categories have been suggested [with reference to a Fourth Helix, by a few delegates to the 2005 Conference] including labour, venture capital, civil society and the informal sector” (2006: 79). However, Etzkowitz and Zhou (2006) did not move in the direction of the idea I have proposed above, of the Fourth Helix as an analytical category comprising university research linkages with civil society structures, such as labour and civic organizations, NGOs, local government bodies etc. Rather, their article considered what they saw as a missing dimension of ‘sustainability’ in the Triple Helix model. They argued in favour of a mechanism for ensuring that the innovation produced by the U-I-G triad does not produce negative or harmful effects. They therefore proposed yet another helix – of university-public-government relations – to prevent such innovation from producing unsustainable effects: “The two helices operate in tandem. The university-industry-government Triple Helix works to promote innovation and economic growth, while the university-government-public one serves as a balance wheel to ensure that innovation and growth take place in ways that will not be harmful to the environment and health…” (2006: 80).

11. The first Triple Helix Conference of U-I-G relations was held in 1996 in Amsterdam, followed by New York (1998), Rio de Janeiro (2000) and Copenhagen (2002). Further conferences have been organized after Turin (2005) as well. See also the beginnings of discussion by Leydesdorff and Etzkowitz (2003) about the idea of a Fourth Helix, after the 2002 conference.

GOVERNMENT

(G)

INDUSTRY

(I)

UNIVERSITIES

(U)

CIVIL SOCIETY

(CS)


Admittedly, the latter argument does incorporate an important new element, the issue of sustainability, including environmental and other harmful effects, spun out by the innovations of U-I-G activities. Nonetheless, it can be argued that this Triple Helix approach, even with the addition of a second sustainability helix, still fails to address how our South African universities (and especially other universities in developing countries) might enhance their research work linked to the needs of CS structures, like community organizations, trade unions, provincial and local government bodies etc. Moreover, U-CS relationships should encompass not only socio-economic development, but also broader social and cultural development themes (the latter are seldom addressed by the Triple Helix literature). At the same time, it must be stressed that there is no reason why such a Fourth Helix of U-CS research relations cannot be developed alongside existing U-I-G relations – which are also much needed for our national economic development.

In this regard it can be noted that issues pertaining to University-Civil Society research relations have recently begun to emerge more strongly in public debates about the role of university research in South Africa – about ‘our universities and the public good’ – with respect to how research might serve the needs of the mass of poor people within civil society (Singh, 2001). And it should also be mentioned that, historically during the anti-apartheid struggle years of the 1970s and 1980s, and also later in the policy engagement years of democratic transition in the 1990s – numerous university research groups, along with individual academics, became involved in substantial social responsiveness research relationships. These were mainly with groups within trade union and civic organizations, with local government bodies and even with political organizations. Thus university-based scholars undertook various forms of research and other scholarly support services – the teaching of off-campus courses, advice on policy documents, workshops on environmental issues and so on – for a range of formal organizations (e.g. of labour, women, civics) and also for informal groupings12. It would be interesting to investigate the extent to which such South African developments over the past three decades have been paralleled by similar forms of ‘scholarship of engagement’ of academics based at universities in other Third World Countries (see below).

It should also be noted that debates about such scholarship of engagement with civil society organizations are not entirely absent in ‘Northern’ countries either. Following the 1960s/70s student protests in Europe ‘science shops’ emerged which sought to enable universities to serve broader communities with research and other educational work (Farkas, 1999). Leydesdorff has recently evaluated the historical development of a collection of such science shops, and shown that, while they have never become mainstream in European universities with respect to research activities, they nonetheless continue to function (Leydesdorff and Ward, 2005). More recently in the USA itself, there have been attempts by some groups of academics to garner support for stronger recognition of the ‘scholarship of engagement’ with broader communities and civic organizations. For example, Campus Compact (2006, 2007), a coalition of more than a thousand USA colleges and university presidents dedicated to campus-based civic engagement, held a 2007 conference focusing specifically on the role of research-intensive universities. This conference resolved to pursue community-engaged scholarship more

12. Perhaps the best insight into these activities can be gleaned from the journal, the South African Labour Bulletin (SALB), from the 1970s until the present day. The SALB was itself an initiative of (mainly) university academics working in relation to the emerging trade union movement, with its first issue in April 1974 (see SALB, 2004, special edition entitled “30 Years On”).



vigorously, with the following definitions emerging from its deliberations: “Community-engaged scholarship: scholarship that involves the faculty member in a mutually beneficial partnership with the community … [and] Community engagement: the application of [university] institutional resources to address and solve challenges facing communities through collaboration with communities …” (Campus Compact Conference Report 2007:6). In addition, the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), representing hundreds of state colleges and universities across the USA, has been driving a call for ‘stepping forward as stewards of place’ through its publication of a guide, under this name, for ‘leading public engagement at state colleges and universities’ (AASCU 2002). AASCU seeks to highlight the leading role of higher education institutions as ‘stewards of place’: a university or college having a leadership and facilitating function in enhancing public engagement with the ‘place’ in which it is located – “inextricably linked with the communities and regions in which they are located”. (AASCU 2002: 9).

Perhaps one of the most significant thrusts for change around the idea of a Fourth Helix,in relation to local regional development, may be coming from the OECD organisation itself. This organisation has historically played a major role in the spread of the concept of National Systems of Innovations (NSIs), since the 1980s), itself linked, as noted above, to ideas about the centrality of U-I-G research relationships with respect to driving ‘innovation’13. Yet over the past decade, there has emerged within the OECD a new stress on ‘regional systems of innovation’ (OECD, 1999). Concepts associated with this, such as ‘learning economy’ and ‘learning region’, have begun to gain currency too. Linked to this, the university is increasingly being viewed as a ‘regional animator’, playing a vital brokerage role in facilitating the transfer of skills and knowledge across networks of actors in the region, and also serving as “a conduit through which research of an international and national nature is transferred” into the region (Gunasekara, 2006: 142). While much of the literature on regional systems of innovation views the university’s regional role primarily in economic terms, Gunasekara suggests that a more encompassing literature around university engagement sees the university “making a broad range of contributions to civil society, for example in cultural and community development” (2006: 142).

Not only has as powerful a global organisation as the OECD begun to take seriously the role of U-CS research relations, but even elite research universities in the Boston region are now explicitly directing some of their attention to the regional role of universities. For example, in 2003 the group of eight powerful research-intensive universities in the Boston region (Harvard, MIT, Boston College, Boston University, Brandeis, Northeastern, Tufts and the University of Massachusetts in Boston) commissioned their own impact study, to explore how this concentration of elite universities might enhance the “economic vitality of the Boston region” (Simha, 2005: 270). Underpinning this investigation was the concern of these universities and their communities that the Boston region should “remain competitive with other regions, including major centres in California, North Carolina, the EU and Asia” (2005: 276).

Thus, support for my idea of U-CS relations, especially at the local regional level, and indirectly for the idea of a Third Capitalist Industrial Revolution, which is driving this process via international competitive pressures for continuous (knowledge-based)

13. See especially Sharif (2006) for a discussion of the historical emergence of the ‘NSI concept’ from the 1980s and its influence on OECD organizational thinking.


technological innovation, seems to be coming implicitly from the OECD and the research-intensive Harvard-group of the Boston area itself! Whether this debate by such leading organizations and universities about the ‘missing’ idea of University-Civil Society research relations will gain momentum, and what specific forms the debate will take (economistic and/or social-cultural, industry and/or community organizations etc.), is still an open question. Nonetheless, my own goal is to pursue the issue of U-CS relations as a major topic of investigation over the next few years; this will be particularly relevant in conjunction with other researchers in developing countries like South Africa, where the problems of mass poverty and unemployment, inequality and popular democracy are such burning issues, including at the Western Cape regional level which has been the focus of my recent research.

References American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU). 2002. Stepping Forward

as Stewards of Place. AASCU: Washington. Retrieved 28 February 2008 (http://www.aascu.org).

Campus Compact Conference Report. 2006. New Times Demand New Scholarship. Research Universities and Civic Engagement: A Leadership Agenda. (Writer/Editor Gibson, C.). Retrieved 28 February, 2008.

(http://www.compact.org/resources/research_universities).

Campus Compact Conference Report. 2007. New Times Demand New Scholarship. Research Universities and Civic Engagement: Opportunities and Challenges. (Writer/Editor Stanton, T.K., Stanford University). Retrieved 28 February, 2008.

(http://www.compact.org/resources/research_universities).

Cooper, D. 2001. Creativity and Chaos: Preliminary Report on the Anatomy of Research Centres/Units at Higher Education Institutions in the Western Cape. University of the Western Cape Papers in Education: 1 December, pp. 46-55.

______. 2005. Applied Research Centres at South African Universities: the Relationship between ‘Base’ Internal Structures and Network ‘Superstructures. In: Industry & Higher Education 19(2): pp. 143-153.

______. 2009. The University in National Development. The Role of Use-Inspired

Research. Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) Press: Cape Town (forthcoming).

Dicken, P. 2003. Global Shift. Reshaping the Global Economic Map in the 21st Century. London: The Guildford Press.

Etzkowitz, H. 2002. MIT and the Rise of Entrepreneurial Science. New York: Routledge.

Etzkowitz, H. and Leydesdorff, L. 1999. Whose Triple Helix? In: Science and Public Policy 26(2): pp. 138-39.

http://www.aascu.org

http://www.aascu.org

http://www.compact.org/resources/research_universities

http://www.compact.org/resources/research_universities



Etzkowitz, H. and Chunyan Z. 2006. Triple Helix Twins: Innovation and Sustainability. In: Science and Public Policy 33(1): pp. 77-83.

Farkas, N. 1999. Dutch Science Shops: Matching Community Needs with University R&D. In: Science Studies 12(2): pp. 33-47.

Gunasekara, C. 2006. The Generative and Developmental Roles of Universities in Regional Innovation Systems. In: Science and Public Policy 33(2): pp. 137-50.

Leydesdorff, L. and Etzkowitz, H. 2003. Can ‘the Public’ be Considered as a Fourth Helix in University-Industry-Government Relations? Report on the Fourth Triple Helix Conference 2002. In: Science and Public Policy 30(1): pp. 55-61.

Leydesdorff, L. and Ward, J. 2005. Science Shops: A Kaleidoscope of Science-Society Collaborations in Europe. In: Public Understanding of Science 14: pp. 353-72.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). 1999. IMHE Report: The Response of Higher Education Institutions to Regional Needs. Retrieved 28 February 2008. (http://www.oecd.org).

______. 2007. OECD Reviews of Innovation Policy. South Africa.

www.sourceoecd.org/scienceIT/9789264038233

Sharif, N. 2006. Emergence and Development of the National Innovation Systems Concept. In: Research Policy 35: pp. 745-66.

Simha, O. R. 2005. The Economic Impact of Eight Research Universities in the Boston Region. In: Tertiary Education and Management 11: pp. 269-78.

Singh, M. 2001. Reinserting the ‘Public Good’ into Higher Education Transformation. Kagisano Higher Education Discussion Series No. 1. Council for Higher Education (CHE): Pretoria.

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Stokes, D.E. 1997. Pasteur’s Quadrant. Basic Science and Technological Innovation. Washington: Brookings Institution Press.

Contact details:

Associate Professor David Cooper,Sociology Department,University of Cape Town,Private Bag,Rondebosch 7700, South Africa.e-mail: [email protected]

http://www.oecd.org

http://www.sourceoecd.org/scienceIT/9789264038233



Chapter �Needs-based knowledge processing through university-community partnerships: higher education inroads into rural community development in Zimbabwe

Nduduzo Phuthi; Paul D. M. Gundani; Isaiah M. Sibanda; Stephen Matope; Champakh T. Parekh

Zimbabwe

1. IntroductionKnowledge, the ultimate competitive advantage for any modern community or organization, gives its possessor a unique and inherently protected commodity for survival and development. Today’s universities are among those organizations credited for spearheading and sustaining the on-going knowledge revolution. In developing countries, universities have come to play a key role within their own societies in a wide range of developmental issues even though they often find themselves acutely outclassed in the competitive international knowledge network (Altbach, 1998). Notably, many universities need sensitization for them to prioritize the integration of local and alien knowledge that should address broader sustainable development needs as perceived by the affected communities. Comparatively, the superior military, economic, intellectual and technological accomplishments of industrialized countries give some of their universities extensive, jealously-guarded power, prompting them to assert themselves as ‘central’ institutions within their countries and in the global knowledge arena. The third world universities remain ‘peripheral’, tending to copy developments from abroad, producing little that is original, and generally not at the frontiers of knowledge. Within developing countries, the Western-sourced education, science, technology and Western human development models appear to perpetrate a socio-economic and knowledge gap among citizens, creating a conservative traditional culture alongside a neo-Western one.

Despite improvements in education and other social lessons from history, the continuing prevalence of mass poverty, ignorance, disease, hunger, wars and social strife in developing countries is proof of failure in the management of ‘possessed’ knowledge, whether local or foreign, old or new. Programmes meant to maximize the beneficial integration of indigenous knowledge with that acquired from alien cultures in areas such as agriculture, health, water, land management and education continue to be embarked upon even when they produce limited success. Leveraging development initiatives on needs-based knowledge is more likely to be acceptable to marginalised and poor communities.

This study explores some perspectives of knowledge processing that can be enhanced by university-community partnerships. The paper reports on a portion of an on-going study involving a university and a rural community engaged in a broad-based partnership in Zimbabwe. The target community’s felt needs for tertiary and higher education as a vehicle for socio-economic development serve as the stimulus for the systematic and scientific mobilization of both indigenous and alien knowledge to the community’s advantage. The outcomes of the study show that lack of a determined strategy to manage and disseminate

Chapter 6 Needs-based knowledge processing through university-community partnerships:

higher education inroads into rural community


available knowledge may delay achievement of goals and perpetrate social mishaps which have long been conquered by other nations of the world.

2. Needs-based community initiativesIn much of the developing world, Western education, science, technology and socio-economic development are an imposition rather than an endemic need articulated by the intended beneficiaries. As a result most developmental projects lack adequate conception and buy-in by the targeted participants. In addition, for political reasons, many modern rural environments and situations no longer promote the extended stay and participation of exclusively foreign experts to propagate development programmes. Many reports of the collapse and partial successes of viable programmes have cast doubt on the capacity, competence and organizational depth of planners and implementers.

People-centred and needs-based sustainable development addresses the real needs of the very people seeking development who must be involved fully and genuinely engaged in their identified mission, using methods such as ‘circles of knowledge’ and ‘knowledge integration’. A circle of knowledge, according to Ranganathan (2007) is a relevant and expanding body of knowledge identified by the members of a community such as in a village or district. The existing knowledge and the needs of a village on critical spheres such as health, agriculture and water management could be captured using a variety of traditional means of documentation and propagation such as stories, songs and skits. Such circles start local, but they expand outwards into district, provincial, national and even the international scene, a form of ‘bottom-up’ approach. ‘Knowledge integration’ is an act of reconciling past and present knowledge (the existing knowledge base) with emerging knowledge. Notably, failure to process and integrate new information with inherited wisdom would erode the grounding in one’s own knowledge system and deepen the dependence on an alien one (Ranganathan, 2007).

“Knowledge itself originates as an individual’s construction of reality that involves feelings, beliefs, and experiences” (Kelleher, 2003). “The individual consequently codifies the constructed knowledge and then transmits or shares it with others until the knowledge becomes group or public knowledge. A progressive organization values the knowledge of individuals as well as that shared between them. The organization, though itself perpetual, and staffed by individuals who come and go, is constantly undergoing inevitable change, and is thus a learning organization. A learning organization promotes and engages in progressive processes such as: systematic problem-solving, experimentation with new approaches, learning from the past, learning from the best practices of others, and transferring knowledge” (Kermally, 1997).

As a knowledge management organization, the modern university thrives on high-value intangible assets and intellectual capital, the non-physical and non-financial claims to future benefits. Alongside patents, brands and copyright are strategic alliances, partnerships and shared visions that exemplify intangible assets and intellectual capital, whose importance is magnified by the fact that they are not restricted to the high technology sector, but are instead dominant in every well-run enterprise (Hand and Baruch, 2003).


According to Gamble and Blackwell (2001) the types of knowledge in and around every organization can be categorized as embodied, represented or embedded. Embodied knowledge is what ‘knowers’ intrinsically know, through learning, and gets stored in their brains. This matches the tacit knowledge (Kothuri, 2002) found in traditional communities which is transmittable to future generations largely through oral communication sanctioned by a few approved custodians. Represented knowledge constitutes the information and skills contained in documents, databases and records for communication and conveyance to others, corresponding to Kothuri’s (2002) ‘explicit knowledge’ that gets collected, stored, distributed and shared primarily as electronic or paper documents. This knowledge can therefore be formally expressed and transferred. Embedded knowledge is evidenced by processes, products, rules and procedures (Gamble and Blackwell, 2001). It corresponds to Kothuri’s (2002) ‘implicit knowledge’ which is midway between tacit and explicit knowledge.

In the face of aggressively-marketed western knowledge and models of socio-economic development, traditional ways of knowing are often relegated to the background even by the affected societies. Consequently, a disjunction, rather than integration, is created between local and alien, present and past knowledge. Situations have occurred in the area of medicine where indigenous and Western practitioners would not cooperate in sharing knowledge, which sometimes resulted in the misappropriation of intellectual property (IP) between the two groups.

3. Knowledge processingThe tradition in the largely rural communities in developing countries is that a large proportion of useful local knowledge remains tacit rather than explicit in the brains of a few custodians (Kothuri, 2002). Transferability in such cases is curtailed since it must often involve personal contact rather than public mediated communication. The efficiency and effectiveness of knowledge transfer are observable when plans, processes and outcomes are accomplished with reasonable precision and within time-frames, such as happens in military academies or even schools. Rural communities find occasion for formal knowledge transfer through meetings, traditional gatherings such as weddings, games, shows, rituals, festivals, various ceremonies and even funerals. In Figure 1 below, the processing of knowledge is depicted as a cycle involving knowledge acquisition or creation, comprehension, categorisation or organization (incorporating knowledge

Figure 1. Knowledge processing model

ACQUISITION Comprehension

Organization UTILISATION

CreationTransfer




modification, integration, and meaning-making), utilization and transfer. The emphasis on knowledge utilization is that knowledge is worthless if it does not produce benefits for the ‘knower(s)’. The benefit of useful knowledge is that it is transferred to other people who are observers or participants in the form of learning and experience.

Generally knowledge growth is enhanced by organic rather than by mechanistic social structures. Knowledge sharing is increased by the use of highly participative structures and cultures, sometimes called high performance – high commitment work systems. For instance a knowledge champion must be made to feel part of the development programme. Involvement via ownership enhances attachment and commitment at the organizational level. (Ahmed et al., 2002)

The knowledge life cycle (KLC) model (Figure 2) by Firestone and McElroy (2003) provides a strategy to study the processing of knowledge in progressive organizations and communities. A deliberate process of knowledge production is embarked on to produce organizational knowledge (OK), with which the community seeks to establish its unique identity or mission. The activities of knowledge production involve learning, claim formulation and evaluation, and information acquisition. Organizational knowledge gets integrated with other incoming and outgoing knowledge to produce a distributed organizational knowledge base (DOKB), which then promotes a business processing environment facilitating easy interface with clients, friends, and the rest of the world. An organization thus uses knowledge for its daily operations as well as for its long-term survival.

Much of organizational knowledge (OK) starts off as tacit, that is, experiential and intuitive, and residing in the brain. Transforming this knowledge into explicit knowledge (documented and communicable information and skills) is a step towards competitive advantage. It is increasingly important for a greater amount of information to reside within the physical domains of organizations rather than in the minds of people (Kothuri, 2002). Traditional methods of transmission such as rituals, stories, drama, sport, song and dance are effective but only for person to person communication, and direct contact lasts only as long as the event. Functional knowledge is best when it is collective, cumulative

Knowledge Production• Individual and group learning• Knowledge claim formulation• Knowledge claim evaluation• Information acquisition

KnowledgeIntegration

Broadcasting,searching, teaching,

sharing

Distributed OrganizationalKnowledge Base (DOKB)

Objective and subjective knowledge

Business Processing Environment• Agents• Artifacts• Business process behaviours

OrganizationalKnowledge (OK)

Figure 2. The knowledge life cycle (adapted from Firestone and McElroy, 2003)


and retrievable, and development practitioners and researchers acknowledge also that indigenous knowledge be at the centre of development rather than be termed ‘alternative’ knowledge. For rural communities seeking development and experiencing challenges, a partnership to help organise and document permitted organizational knowledge is a good option.

4. University-community partnershipsThird world universities face a paradox. They are minnows in the international league of world-class institutions and are dependent on foreign counterparts in many respects, yet they are quite central to their own local societies (Altbach, 1998). A university in a third world country produces skilled human resources (HR), offers employment and business to citizens, contributes to national leadership and policy, and other functions. Yet, by and large, these universities remain elitist, using foreign languages, and tend to be mainly urban institutions separated both physically and intellectually from the large rural majorities.

Community engagement for academic purposes by higher education institutions (HEI’s) has been defined as those “initiatives and processes through which the expertise of the higher education institution in areas of teaching and research are applied to address issues relevant to its community” (University World News, 2008). Communities and organizations may not be interested in the university’s teaching and research, but they cooperate in joint activities if there is clearly a mutual benefit such as benchmarking or other competitive advantage (Kermally, 1997). In the spirit of mutual benefits, increased and sustained collaboration between universities and their communities changes the academic process and the profile of faculty. Outward-looking academic staff, with experience to ensure the sustenance of joint activities between communities and academic institutions (Martin, 2000), use these linkages to improve the relevance of their teaching and research. A number of other unplanned activities and benefits such as consultancies, enterprise development and staff professional development may result from well managed partnerships. Frazer (1994) contends that quality is achieved when universities are accountable to society, employers, to students and to each other, and that accountability is not merely financial.

5. Community engagement through researchA broad-based multi-disciplinary partnership programme is in operation between a university and a rural community in Zimbabwe. The partnership involves various academic departments of the university responding to expressions of felt needs by the rural community, and then identifying intervention projects to address the expressed needs. The community consists of two neighbouring administrative rural districts of Zimbabwe sharing a small town. The community are keen to respond to the runaway advances in technology around them, and the challenges of the widening socio-economic gap among members of their community are a major concern. The study utilized existing leadership structures in the community such as village development committees, wards and local government councils. The portion of the partnership programme addressed by the authors in this study involved an intervention on higher education conceptualization




and needs assessment with a view to recommending solutions to address identified needs. The aim of the study is to map out the processing of knowledge pertaining to the role of tertiary and higher education in rural community development using mutually beneficial university-community partnerships. Knowledge processing in this context implies the scientific acquisition, creation, comprehension, organization and utilization of socially relevant knowledge generated by, and within, a community seeking its own socio-economic development. The research set out to answer the key question: how does the community process the knowledge they possess on higher education to shape their efforts at socio-economic self-empowerment?

6. MethodologyThe operational structure of the partnership was set as shown in Figure 3. The coordinators of the partnership consisted of the research team (academics from the university) and community representatives (parents, teachers, and students). The coordinators would then interact with the rest of the community members for wider information gathering and participation in the project. The coordinators initially engaged among themselves in participatory dialogue in a series of meetings and discussions to gain mutual confidence and to brainstorm the general needs of both partners. From an interpretation of the community needs, the research team developed a research undertaking to establish what knowledge the rural people in the community had on: (a) the structure and operation of the higher and tertiary education system in the country; (b) the personal and public importance of higher and tertiary education; (c) the application of existing knowledge in planning the education of their children; (d) how they passed the knowledge to children and future generations; (e) the community’s past successes and challenges in preparing their high school students for university and college education. Interviews were held with systematically selected members of the wider community including local leaders, local administration officials, parents, teachers, education officials, students and school leavers. Reviews of documents and other records on high school students’ preparation for higher education and training in the districts were made.

Figure 3. The operating structure of the university- community partnership

PARTNERSHIP COORDINATORS

UNIVERSITYResearch Team

COMMUNITYRepresentatives

COMMUNITY MEMBERSLocal leadership, parents, teachers, current

and former students, civil servants, educationofficials, businesspeople, etc.


7. Emerging community knowledgeIn the public meetings held with community representatives and teachers, the latter had substantial knowledge on the structure and operations of the higher education while the elders, parents and some students were deficient on issues such as the following: entry requirements, fees structure, the location and numbers of national colleges and universities, the curricula, and accommodation matters. The sharing of experiences between those parents who had succeeded in sending their children to tertiary and higher education institutions in the past seemed to assist in spreading knowledge around, but this was inadequate. All parents established the fact that a drive towards higher education required upgrading the primary and secondary education foundation first. Indeed, some parents were keen on a programme of upgrading primary and secondary schools where they experienced problems, before tackling higher education.

It was acknowledged that many school-going children in the community missed classes to participate in tasks such as tending livestock, working in the fields and guarding crops and homesteads. When asked what they considered as more valuable between (higher) education and physical wealth such as livestock, seasonal crops, and the household possessions, more parents thought education was more important but the problem was the delays and uncertainties of the anticipated benefits. An education beyond the basic literacy level would confer benefits to the individual, the family and the community, albeit in the very long term. Other views obtained from discussion sessions and interviews included the following:

College and university keep bright youths away from aimless roaming in the villages where they indulge in drug and alcohol abuse, crime, and other misbehaviour which derailed their orientation to ‘good’ life both in the traditional and modern sense.

For girls, gender-related stereotypes were reduced, and early pregnancies were often avoided.

Whereas in the past, people with a little education could prosper or get into positions of leadership locally and nationally, it was becoming difficult nowadays.

Monetary wealth, property, cattle and family businesses were no longer a reliable form of family ineritance.

Additionally, it was acknowledged that colleges and universities in the past had produced role models who became an inspiration to other children in the community. However, these role models were very few in number and most went on to reside and work outside their parent communities after adopting better lifestyles, thereby ceasing to be visible. News of successful children, however, spread around very quickly. Tertiary and higher education were perceived to be able to identify intellectuals and potential experts especially females among the community who would otherwise be denied a chance to establish a lifestyle of their own choice. The advocates for traditional culture disagreed with this. They felt that traditional systems required intellectuals in areas such as healing, and schools and western ways of living were now claiming many of them, .

On the basis of knowledge that education was a potential social emancipator, parents and leaders in the community were expected to put up strategies to maximise progression of their children through the various levels of the education ladder. However, the knowledge was not processed and used scientifically, as in the case of extended families

•

•

•

•




that cooperated in many family rituals but failed to pull together resources to support the education of one bright child among them. Parents and community leaders were sceptical of the benefits of prolonged education, citing how teachers, nurses, junior civil servants employed on the bases of standard qualifications were experiencing severe economic hardships compared to school dropouts who opted to skip the borders to work as labourers on farms, in mines, as domestic workers or other menial jobs. Many parents were adamant that in their experience, academic education beyond functional literacy had not rewarded them or their children. The homesteads of families with ‘less educated’ members in the diaspora were quickly transformed into more modern and decent structures compared to many of those with ‘educated’ family members.

Knowledge of the present and future needs of students by parents revealed both a generation and a perception gap. Many parents were not clear on the specific study needs of their children, e.g. amount of time, supporting resources, and the necessary emotional environment. Very little deliberate effort was thus given for the provision of time for study at home to secondary school children who would be preparing for entry into tertiary and higher education. Moreover, few families put up long term financial plans to prepare to send their children to college or university.

The districts relied on central government and donors for funds for infrastructure that supports schooling such as classrooms, staff houses, roads, telecommunications, transport, health and other facilities. External assistance in financial, material and skills was identified as crucial in mobilising initial mass support for developmental projects which would employ highly trained local personnel. The administrators were keen to see the community weaned from external donors in the shortest possible time so as to exercise their own empowerment. The officials expressed concern at the settlement patterns which tended to scatter homesteads, pastures, fields, business services, spacing of schools which resulted in school children having to travel long distances. Service provision and monitoring were also affected. The district officials had long identified the need for upgrading tertiary education within the district as well as access to higher and tertiary education in national institutions outside the districts. Indeed, proposals had been made for the twin districts to consider establishing a polytechnic and a university.

Parents in general were not getting all the necessary information about educational matters, much more so if they did not regularly attend school functions or contact school staff on matters affecting their children. The generation and education gap also aggravated the situation, such that many parents could not check on their children’s school work, let alone assist them. The research team identified the possible use of publications and more publicity events from outside as a solution.

On passing on the skills of survival, parents indicated they had less and less time with their children than they had previously so they depended on the school to fill the gap. There was an ever-widening generation gap and parents could not fulfil their role of lifelong mentors. Thus children seemed to satisfy their quest for knowledge by picking up views and ideas from around rather than through the family structures. Parents with property, wealth and education appeared to have a better chance of passing their knowledge to their children. In line with Firestone and McElroy’s (2003) knowledge life cycle (KLC) model, the knowledge production phase which requires a collective community effort to source and create a knowledge base was not evident in this community, as parents


had no identifiable common platform from which to share, acquire, modify, integrate and make meaning of their knowledge before utilising and transferring it.

Although the community had a variety of secondary and high schools including boarding and day, government, mission, and community, concerned members of the community lamented the lack of resources, unstable staffing situation and the subsequent comparative academic performance of high schools and their students compared to other similar communities, indicating that much has to be done to realize self-determined community aspirations. In essence the schools within the community were not meeting their expectations of producing sufficient students for proceeding to colleges and universities. Data on current performance of students in high schools was still being collected and verified with the education officials.

8. ConclusionAs the third world pushes towards technological advancement and economic prosperity, individual countries are aware that they need to transform large sections of their societies, especially the rural communities. The requisite for sustainable development in these areas is best approached through a heritage of documentable and transferable knowledge that responds to the prevalence of poverty on one hand, and to the destructive and consumptive tendencies of advancing technology that threatens our planet on the other. Ideal knowledge processing for developing countries involves integrating existing cultural and community-specific knowledge with other knowledge accruing through the experiences of a people. The erstwhile motivation for wholesale acquisition of western knowledge is no longer encouraged.

Individuals and groups with common goals and interests possess and acquire knowledge for their welfare and survival. Sometimes the poorest communities require advanced and well-researched solutions to their problems, but these are seldom available to them, or, if available, are not systematically coordinated, due to administrative red tape. Institutions of higher and tertiary education have existed for many years in the country, yet knowledge about them and their operations is scarce among communities, or, if available, is not being utilised fully, remaining in the minds of a few people who do not transfer it to other potential users. Lack of facilities, resources and strategies retards the systematic processing of available knowledge.

This study has advocated the promotion of knowledge processing approaches and strategies in an organization’s operations and growth. The reported study in progress undertaken by a university in partnership with a rural community in Zimbabwe reinforces the need for determined knowledge acquisition and deployment. While further data collection is under way on knowledge processing in the area of tertiary and higher education, it is anticipated to extend the study theme on knowledge acquisition, creation and processing to include the integration of western science and technology with local indigenous knowledge on issues pertinent to rural communities such as water and sanitation, health, food, livestock, crop production, and entertainment. The whole project is intended to touch as many members in the community as possible, shaping their world views, improving their lifestyles, and unlocking some of their valuable ‘hidden’ knowledge to their advantage and for possible documentation and publication.




ReferencesAhmed, P.K.; Kok, L.K. and Loh, A.Y.E. 2002. Learning through Knowledge Management.

Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.

Altbach, P.G. 1998. Comparative Higher Education: Knowledge, the University, and Development. Ablex. USA.

Firestone, J. M. and McElroy, M. W. 2003. Key Issues in the New Knowledge Management. Butterworth-Heinemann, USA.

Frazer, M. 1994. Quality in Higher education: An International Perspective. In: Green, D. (ed.,) What is Quality in Higher education? SRHE and OUP.

Gamble, P.R. and Blackwell, J. 2001. Knowledge Management: A State of the Art Guide. Kogan Page, UK and USA.

Gladstone, B. 2000. From Know-how to Knowledge: The Essential Guide to Understanding and Implementing Knowledge Management. Industrial Society, USA.

Hand, J.R.M. and Baruch, L. 2003. Intangible Assets: Values, Measures and Risks. OUP, UK.

Kelleher, D. 2003. Organizational Learning: A borrowed Toolbox? In: Laura Roper, L.; Pettit, J. and Eade, D. (eds.), Development and the Learning Organization. Oxfam, UK.

Kermally, S. 1997. Total Management Thinking: Ideas that are Transforming Management. REPP, Oxford.

Kothuri, S. 2002. Knowledge in Organizations: Definition, Creation, and Harvesting. http://www.gse.havard.edu/~t656_web/Spring_2002_students/kothuri_smita_knowledge_in_orgs.htm

Martin, M. 2000. University-Industry Partnerships: the Changing Context. Paris, International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP).

Ranganathan, A. 2007. Using ICT to place Indigenous Knowledge Systems at the heart of Education for Sustainable Development. http://www.ceeindia.org/esf/download/paper47.pdf

University World News. 2008. Community Engagement as a Core HE Function. http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20080222100232277. Accessed 29/2/08.

http://www.gse.havard.edu/~t656_web/Spring_2002_students/kothuri_

http://www.ceeindia.org/esf/download/paper47.pdf

http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20080222100232277


Contact details:

Nduduzo Phuthi, Department of Technical Teacher Education,National University of Science and Technology,P.O. Box AC 939,Ascot, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.e-mail: [email protected]

Paul D. M. Gundani,Department of Sport Science & Coaching, National University of Science and Technology,e-mail: [email protected]

Isaiah M. Sibanda,Department of Technical Teacher Education,National University of Science and Technology,e-mail: [email protected]

Stephen MatopeNational University of Science and Technology,Zimbabwe.e-mail: [email protected]

Champakh T. Parekh,National University of Science and Technology,Zimbabwe.





PART3Case studies on knowledge systems:

mapping, analyzing and measuring research capacities and

human resources

Chapter 7Scientific mobility and international research collaboration:

case of ChinaKoen Jonkers

Chapter 8Analytical and comparative study of the Palestinian research

knowledge national systemLabib Arafeh


Chapter �Scientific mobility and international research collaboration: Case of China

Koen Jonkers, Spain

AbstractThis paper explores the effects of scientific mobility on international research collaboration in China. Two phenomena which are related to scientific mobility are explored. The first is the research collaboration in which Chinese researchers with foreign work experience engage after their return to China. The second is the research collaboration in which overseas Chinese researchers engage with researchers in mainland China. Both phenomena influence the global balance of international co-publications between China and its main partner countries.

1. IntroductionThis chapter discusses the relationship between scientific mobility and international collaboration. The main empirical basis is formed by a study of the impact of scientific mobility on the transformation and internationalization of the Chinese public sector research system with a particular focus on the life sciences which was conducted in the framework of a doctoral thesis defended in February 2008 at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy (Jonkers, 2008a). More detailed discussion of these findings can be found in several recent and forthcoming publications (Jonkers and Tijssen, 2008, Jonkers, 2009a). The thesis is currently being reworked in the context of a book project (Jonkers, 2009b).

Scientists have always been among the most internationally mobile professionals. Over the past decades the international mobility of students and scientists has increased rapidly worldwide. This mobility occurs among scientists from research systems in Western Europe and North America. In the past three decades the in-coming flows of students and scientists from developing and emerging countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America have also become increasingly important features of the development of scientific manpower in European and American research systems as well.

Since students and scientists often do not have fixed plans to move to a host country on a permanent basis, and because they tend to remain internationally mobile after having studied or worked in their (first) host country the movement of members of these groups tend to be referred to as ‘international mobility’ rather than ‘migration’. Of increasing interest, to both migration scholars and scholars of higher education, science, technology and innovation in developing countries, are the return flows of researchers (and entrepreneurs) to their home country as well as the circulation of highly-skilled professionals between host and home

Chapter 7 Scientific mobility and international research collaboration: case of China


country. These trends, even if small in scope in relative terms, can off-set some of the perceived disadvantages traditionally ascribed to the so-called ‘brain drain’ which refers to the loss of human capital (HC) experienced by the sending country when students and highly- skilled professionals leave. Another factor that can help alleviate some of these perceived disadvantages is the role which overseas scientists can play in the development of their home system. Both factors, which are (primarily) the result of the international mobility of students and scientists from developing countries to countries in the ‘centre’ of higher education and scientific research, will be discussed in this study.

International cooperation in research occurs in many different forms. In broad interpretation most forms of interaction by researchers, either in person or across longer distances in the form of information exchange and answers to queries, can be understood as forms of scientific cooperation. Such a broad understanding of scientific cooperation can even include the reading and citing of each other’s publications. More narrow understandings of the phenomenon include only the working together on joint projects with the aim to produce joint publications. This latter form of international scientific cooperation will be referred to in this study as research collaboration. For a review of the literature on this subject see Katz and Martin (1997). The increase in the frequency of international research collaboration over the past decades, as measured in terms of the number of international co-publications, has been well documented (Wagner and Leydesdorff, 2005).

There are a wide variety of reasons for researchers to collaborate (internationally) (see a.o. Katz and Martin, 1997; Beaver, 2001). These motivations include potential gains in time efficiency, the access to cognitive resources; research ideas, knowledge and skills, access to material resources; research funding, research materials, research infrastructure, and the access to symbolic resources, because the collaboration with eminent scientists can increase the visibility of a knowledge claim and hence the symbolic capital of the co-authors. During the past decades governmental and intermediary organizations worldwide have stressed the value of (international) research collaboration and implemented schemes to offer support to this activity (Katz and Martin, 1997).

The strengthening of scientific ties between emerging research systems and research systems in North America and Western Europe is not only of interest to the first group of countries. Over the past ten years governmental and intermediary organizations in the latter, ‘central’, research systems have been pursuing strategies that aim to foster the formation of international collaborative ties with emerging research systems which play an increasingly prominent role in the production of scientific knowledge (Zhou and Leydesdorff, 2006, Jonkers, 2009a). The country which receives the largest degree of attention from these initiatives is the emerging research system of China.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the “Cultural Revolution” had played a strong role in diminishing the existing research capacity of the Chinese research system. This period negatively affected the available research infrastructure as well as the presence of qualified researchers who were needed to rebuild China’s research capabilities in the following decades. Since 1978, after a period of isolation from the international scientific community, the Chinese research system has embarked on a process of ‘opening up’ to the outside world. Since then, the research system underwent a transformation from a centrally planned research system which shared many features with the Soviet system to a


research system which shares many features with research systems in North America and Western Europe.

In order to meet the ambitious national goals set out in 1978 and the early 1980s, an important priority was to rebuild the stocks of scientific human resources. A central element of the strategy to achieve this aim was to send Chinese students and researchers abroad to study and work in more advanced research and higher education systems. Upon their return these researchers were expected to help rebuild Chinese research capacity. Where initially the students and researchers who were sent overseas were all sponsored by the national government, at a later stage research organizations were also allowed to send out their students and staff and finally students were allowed to go abroad independently. The return rates were much lower than was initially expected. In the first years of its open door policies, the Chinese leadership stated that it would not be a problem if a small percentage of researchers did not return: however, it was confronted with a situation in which only a small percentage did (Zweig and Rosen, 2003). Faced with criticism over the perceived brain drain from China the Chinese leadership maintained its strategy of allowing and promoting overseas study (Zweig and Rosen, 2003; Cao, 2004).

During the past thirty years the Chinese research system underwent a considerable institutional and organizational transformation. Slowly many features of the centrally planned research system were replaced by institutional features which also characterize research systems in Western Europe and North America. Examples of these features include the distribution of project-based funding by a national research council, a relative increase in the role of research universities as performers of scientific research, new research intensive subunits in universities and research institutes, and output-based evaluation and promotion structures.

2. MethodologyThe methodological approach used for the broader project which is briefly discussed in this paper consisted of several elements. Some of these elements are introduced in this section. The study of the institutional and organizational changes which the Chinese research system underwent in the past decades is based primarily on a study of existing scholarly literature as well as on a wealth of grey literature, newspaper articles, government reports and statistics, expert interviews, etc. Similar sources have also been used for a study of trends in the outbound flows of students and researchers, the policy response to these trends and the programmes set up to foster the temporary and permanent return of overseas Chinese scientists (Jonkers, 2008b; Cao, 2004; Zweig, 2006).

The study of the trends in international visibility of various life science subfields and the trends in international research collaboration are based on publication and citation analyses. International co-publications are an imperfect measure for research collaboration (Katz and Martin, 1997), but remain among the best quantifiable indicators available. For this reason they have been used frequently as an indicator for the intensity of international collaboration. For reviews about research collaboration and the study of international co-publications see Katz and Martin (1997) and Glänzel and Schubert (2005). The assessment of the relative size of overseas Chinese scientific communities is based



on a bibliometric indicator which was compiled by making use of Chinese surnames (See among others Jin et al., 2007, Jonkers 2009a).

The assessment of the relative number of returned scientists was restricted to high quality plant molecular life science research organizations in Beijing and Shanghai. It thus represents only a small segment of the Chinese research system. The study of the publication and international co-publication behaviour of these researchers was based on a combination of data relating to mobility history and publication data. Again this study was restricted to a narrow sample of researchers. Without further study its results should, therefore, not be extrapolated for the Chinese research system as a whole (Jonkers and Tijssen, 2008).

3. Results Over the last ten years the international visibility of the Chinese research system has increased very rapidly (Zhou and Leydesdorff, 2006). The development of the international visibility of China’s research in various life science fields (relative to the global average) shows considerable differences (among others Jonkers, 2009a). While China’s share in the plant molecular life sciences (Jonkers and Tijssen, 2008) was around 10 per cent in 2005, China’s share of, for example, the total number of cell biology articles lags far behind (Jonkers, 2009a). The same holds for another indicator: the number of citations per paper, relative to the average number of citations which a paper, published anywhere in the world, receives (Moed et al., 1995). Again, the Chinese research system scores high in the plant molecular life sciences. In this subfield, when adopting a two year citation window, the Chinese research system was at the global average in 2003. And again, the other life science subfields score considerably lower on this indicator (Jonkers and Tijssen, 2008, Jonkers, 2009a). These differences can be explained with reference to the priorities of Chinese research policies, international developments, and differences in the manpower situation in the different fields.

The growing number of international co-publications with researchers in North America and Western Europe can explain part of the increase in China’s international visibility. In fact, until several years ago, almost all of China’s publications in high impact international journals were the results of joint publications with foreign partners. The normalized citation scores of international co-publications tend to be considerably higher than those for the total average of China’s publications, but this is also true for the international co-publications of other countries.

The growth in the number of overseas students was particularly large in the 1990s (Zhang and Li, 2001) before stabilizing at around 120,000 students leaving China annually in the first years of this century. According to assessments by government officials, the number of students leaving China for overseas study will grow further to around 200,000 in 2010 (Anonymous, 2006). An assessment of trends in the geographical spread of students is based on data collected by UNESCO (2008). This data, shown in Figure 1, reveals that, while the USA was for a long time the main destination country for Chinese students, the Member States of the European Union (EU) have collectively overtaken the USA in recent years. The United Kingdom (UK), especially, saw a rapid increase in its inflow of Chinese students since the turn of the century. Over the past decades, the average return rate from


the USA was far lower than the return rate from Western European countries. In 1999 around 17 per cent of students had returned from the USA and 50 per cent from Western Europe (Zhang, 2003). Considering the larger flow of students to the USA over the past two decades and the higher retention rate, the size of the communities of graduated overseas Chinese students is thought to be largest in the USA.

Figure 1. Mobility flows of Chinese students per host country

Source: UNESCO, 2008.

This UNESCO data concerns students rather than scientists. The OECD (2004) provides an alternative data source on highly-skilled professionals. However, the statistics collected by national governments and international organizations do not provide a very fine grained picture of the size of communities of overseas (Chinese) scientists. A bibliometric assessment provides an alternative indicator for the growing contribution of this group of researchers in the research output of research systems in North America and Western Europe. The approach taken allows one to make such an assessment for specific subfields of research (Jonkers, 2009a). Overseas Chinese researchers are considered to play an increasingly important role as collaborative partners for researchers in mainland China (Jin et al., 2007). In doing so, they thus contribute to the performance of the Chinese research system while remaining abroad. What is more, they influence the relative share of China’s international co-publications with its various partner countries; in recent years countries with a large overseas Chinese scientific community co-publish a relatively large number of co-publications with researchers in mainland China (Jonkers, 2009a). Jonkers (2009c) explores the study of transnational research collaboration, and international research collaboration between researchers with a shared ethnic or cultural background, in more depth.

Apart from engaging in formal research collaboration with their mainland counterparts, overseas Chinese researchers also engage in many other forms of scientific cooperation. In addition, overseas Chinese scientists play other roles which are important for the functioning of the Chinese science system. For example, overseas Chinese researchers have been engaged in the review of research proposals submitted to the Chinese national research council, the NSFC. Overseas Chinese researchers also take part in evaluating the

Mobility flows of Chinese students per host country (UNESCO, 2008)

0

20.000

40.000

60.000

80.000

100.000

120.000

1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006

JapanEU-15, Switzerland and NorwayUnited States



performance of research institutes of the Chinese Academy of Science. Finally, there are examples of researchers who head laboratories or entire research institutes in mainland China while maintaining their professional position abroad (in the USA).

Since the early 1990s, Chinese governmental and intermediary organizations have implemented a broad range of programmes to stimulate the short term and permanent return of overseas Chinese scientists. In the ‘temporary return migration programmes’, overseas Chinese researchers come to mainland China for a short period of time to teach or engage in joint research. Several manpower development programme target researchers who return from overseas. These programmes include the one hundred talent programme of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). This programme offers researchers in CAS institutes US$200,000 to US$300,000 to set up their laboratories and establish their research. China’s national research council, the NSFC, established a separate programme, the ‘excellent young scientist award’, which has a similar objective to the hundred talent programme and is open to researchers from both the universities and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Jonkers (2008b) provides an overview of return migration programmes in China and other large ‘sending countries’. For other sources of information on the Chinese case the reader can also refer to Zweig (2006) and Cao (2004).

At present, over 60 per cent of the senior researchers in top level plant molecular life science research organizations in Beijing and Shanghai have worked abroad. Jonkers and Tijssen (2008) showed that these researchers have, apart from a higher publication and international co-publication rate, a relatively high tendency to co-publish with researchers in their former host country. This latter finding indicates that scientific social capital also has an influence on scientific human capital. While the number of international co-publications is influenced by both scientific human capital and scientific social capital, the fact that a large share of these co-publications are made with researchers in former host countries is only affected by scientific social capital. The network of professional contacts with foreign researchers is accumulated during the period in which they worked abroad.

Returned researchers have played an important role in raising the international visibility of the Chinese research system in the life sciences during the past decade. Most, in fact almost all, publications in high impact life science journals, for example, are made by researchers who have spent some time abroad. As was discussed in the previous section, the returned researchers also tend to engage in a higher degree of international co-publication.

The institutional support for collaboration between mainland Chinese researchers and their colleagues in North America and Western Europe, which is offered by Chinese and ‘Western’ intermediary organizations, has grown considerably over the past decade. Some of this support is specifically targeted at maximising the benefits of scientific mobility for international research collaboration. In the case of Chinese intermediary organizations, the national research council (NSFC) has set up programmes which specifically target overseas Chinese researchers to encourage collaboration with their mainland counterparts. European intermediary bodies meanwhile engage in some attempts to support researchers who were trained in their research system to establish themselves upon return to China and to support collaboration with researchers in their former host system. One of the strategies used to achieve this aim is through the establishment of international joint laboratories. The German Max Planck Gesellschaft, for example, has


established twenty-one so-called partner groups in the past decade. These partner groups are headed by former alumni of the Max Planck Institutes and form a formal partnership between the research organization in mainland China and a Max Planck Institute in Germany. In this way interaction between returnees and their former host organization continues to be supported.

4. Discussion and conclusionScientific mobility, both in terms of the outbound flow of students and researchers to higher education and research systems in Australia, Japan, North America and Western Europe, as well as the return of researchers with work experience in these countries, has played an important role in the internationalisation of the Chinese research system and the formation of scientific ties between China and its partner systems in Western Europe, North America, and the Asia-Pacific Region.

Returnees not only bring back scientific knowledge and skills, but also maintain their contacts with foreign peers after returning. These existing contacts allow them to continue to collaborate with foreign peers and in doing so continue to engage in the interactive learning process which is central to modern scientific practice.

Researchers who have not returned to China permanently continue to play important roles in the further development and internationalisation of the Chinese research system. The many roles they perform include collaboration with researchers in mainland China. This effect appears to be so large that it influences the balance of international co-publications between China and its main partner countries. Those countries with a relatively large overseas Chinese scientific community have also developed stronger collaborative ties with mainland China.

The collaboration of mainland Chinese researchers with overseas Chinese scientists is actively supported by Chinese intermediary organizations. Several foreign intermediary organizations support returned Chinese researchers to maintain collaborative ties with their former host organization.

Further studies are required to test whether the exploratory findings relating to the international co-publication behaviour of Chinese researchers with researchers in their former host systems can be generalised to the entire Chinese research system. A comparative study of returnees in other main sending countries would help to clarify whether this relationship is China specific or not. The approach used to study the role of overseas scientific communities cannot be applied to researchers from every country. However, it may be used for researchers from some other countries and, for other countries this relationship can be explored through alternative methodological approaches.

Forthcoming publications explore in more detail the transformation and internationalization of the Chinese research system, both in terms of the institutional arrangements, in regard to its international visibility, and to the factors which can help explain the observed developments. Apart from internationalization in terms of international scientific cooperation, the process of international scientific mobility arguably plays a role in the institutional transformation of the Chinese research system



and its increasing international visibility. While this study focused on China, follow up studies could explore the development of research capacity in other emerging research systems in Asia and Latin America to compare the relative performance and to explore the factors which enable the research system in specific fields of research to become world class.

ReferencesAnonymous. 2006. Official: Students Overseas to Double by 2010; In: China Daily, 17

October 2006. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2006-10/17/content_709813.htm

Beaver, D. 2001. Reflections on Scientific Collaboration (and its study): Past, Present, and Future. In: Scientometrics, 52 (3): pp.365-377.

Cao, C. 2004. China’s Efforts at Turning ‘Brain Drain” into ‘Brain Gain’. EAI Background Briefs, Singapore East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore.

Glänzel, W.; Schubet, A. 2004. Analysing Scientific Networks through Co-authorship. In: Moed, H.F.; Glänzel, W.; and Smoch, U. (eds.), Handbook of Quantitative Science and Technology Research, Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishing.

Jin, B.H.; Rousseau, R.; Suttmeier, R.P.; Cao, C. 2007. The Role of Ethnic ties in International Collaboration: the Overseas Chinese Phenomenon. In: Tores-Salinas, D.; Ores-Salinas, D.; Moed, H.F. (eds.), 11th International Conference of the International Society for Scientometrics and Informetrics, CSIC, Madrid, Spain.

Jonkers, K. 2008a. Scientific Mobility and the Internationalisation of the Chinese Research System. Ph.D. thesis defended at the European University Institute, San Domenico di Fiesole, Italy.

Jonkers, K. 2008b. A Comparative Study of Return Migration Policies Targeting the Highly Skilled in Four Major Sending Countries. In: MIREM Analytical Report, AR2008-05, RSCAS/EUI, Florence.

Jonkers, K. 2009a. Emerging Ties, Factors underlying China’s Changing Co-publication Patterns with Western European and North American Research Systems in the Molecular Life Sciences. Scientometrics (in press).

Jonkers, K., 2009b, Tides of Change, Scientific Mobility and the Development of China’s Research System (forthcoming).

Jonkers, K., 2009c, Transnational Research Collaboration; an Approach to Study Collaboration between Overseas Chinese Scientists and their Mainland Colleagues. In: Brauböck et al., Transnationalism and Diasporas: Conceptual, Theoretical and Methodological Challenges, IMISCOE-Amsterdam University Press Series (in press).

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2006-10/17/content_


Jonkers, K. and Tijssen, R. 2008. Chinese Researchers Returning Home: Impacts of International Mobility on Research Collaboration and Scientific Productivity. In: Scientometrics, Vol. 77, No. 2.

Katz, J. S.; Martin, B. R. 1997. What is Research Collaboration? In: Research Policy, 26: pp. 1-18.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). 2004. Database on immigrants and expatriates, (OECD), Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs, http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/18/24/34792388.xls

UNESCO. 2008. Table 18. entitled: International flows of mobile students at the tertiary level (ISCED 5 and 6) available online at: http://stats.uis.unesco.org/ReportFolders/reportFolders.aspx

Wagner, C. S.; Leydesdorff, L. 2005. Network Structure, Self-Organization, and the Growth of International Collaboration in Science. In: Research Policy, 34: pp.1608-1618.

Zhang, G.C. 2003. Migration of Highly Skilled Chinese to Europe: Trends and Perspective. In: International Migration, 41, pp. 73-97.

Zhang, G.C. and Li, WJ. 2002. International Mobility of China’s Resources in Science and Technology and its Impact. Chapter 11: International Mobility of the Highly Skilled, Paris, OECD.

Zhou, P. and Leydesdorff, L. 2006. The Emergence of China as a Leading Nation in Science, In: Research Policy, 35: pp. 83-104.

Zweig, D. 2006. Learning to Compete: China’s Strategies to Create a ‘Reverse Brain Drain’. In: Kuptsch, C. and Pang, E.F. (eds.), Competing for Global Talent, International Labour Organization (ILO), 2006, pp.187-213.

Zweig, D.; Rosen, S. 2003. How China Trained a New Generation Abroad, SCIDEV.NET 22 May 2003, http://www.scidev.net/en/features/how-china-trained-a-new-generation-abroad.html

Acknowledgements: This study is based on parts of a Ph.D. Thesis defended at the European University Institute (EUI) and financed through a Ph.D. Grant of the Dutch Ministry of Education (MoE).

Contact details

Koen JonkersCSIC Institute of Public Goods and Policies (IPP-CCHS), Systems and Policies for Research and Innovation (SPRI_SCIMAGO), Madrid, Spain.e-mail: [email protected]

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/18/24/34792388.xls

http://stats.uis.unesco.org

http://www.scidev.net/en/features/how-china-trained-a-new-generation-abroad.html





Chapter �Analytical and comparative study of the Palestinian research knowledge national system

Labib Arafeh, Palestine

1. Executive summaryThis is a brief analytical and comparative study of the Palestinian Research Knowledge National System. The various sources of information include websites, publications, and personal communications. There are several names for Palestine including Palestinian Authority (PA), Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), West Bank & Gaza (WB&G), etc. In this study we will adopt the name the OPT to refer to Palestine.

OPT has a population of less than four million inhabitants, with a low per capita GDP (US$1,178), a high unemployment rate of 33.4 per cent, and a poverty level which reached 56.6 per cent in 2008, according to the latest statistics. OPT has not yet reached the status of an independent country, but, rather, is under occupation. OPT thus suffers from unstable political, social, and economic conditions.

Historically speaking, the national system of research knowledge was established around thirty-five years ago. Research was, and still is, performed mainly at universities and other organizations that focus on specific fields. With the establishment of the Council of Scientific Research at the Ministry of Higher Education, research centres and faculties were organized and coordinated, establishing, in turn, a national research vision, priorities and strategic plans. However, the Council of Scientific Research was inactive for several reasons.

Although research normally requires minimum conditions, a special research environment and a stable political and economic situation, even so Palestinian universities have made a major contribution to research in the occupied territories, achieving a reasonable research production ratio of 0.21 for the three universities included in this study, as well as two patents in the process of registration.

The OPT’s main contributors to research include thirteen universities, and several specialist organizations. Three universities were considered in this study due to the availability of sufficient data. In addition, the main Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that focus on research as their objective were also considered in this study.

The Palestinian national research system is a fragmented one, with separate research centres and faculties that are urged to work together in order to produce sufficient professional research resources and a research environment that otherwise is not feasible. Thus, the author urges all national research stakeholders to bridge the gaps between them and coordinate their efforts in a complementary rather than a competitive spirit. These stakeholders include all research centres and faculties in public and private public sectors.


This will bring about the boosting of research and the establishment of a spirit of the Research and Development (R&D), setting national priorities, and sharing the available limited funds for national sustainable development. At the university level, the university is urged to consider research as a major function and set aside a fixed budget for scientific research. Universities should be required to establish appropriate mechanisms to foster and monitor the university research environment.

It has to be stated that the main findings of this brief study need further investigation in order to analyse more deeply the research knowledge system at the OPT, and accordingly propose a new feasible national system for a framework of research and knowledge.

2. BackgroundThe Palestinian Authority that includes the Gaza Strip and West Bank or Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), nomenclature used by some of the international organizations including the International Labor Organization (ILO), in reality still exists under military occupation, and has not achieved its national independence. Staff, students and people in general are unable to move around at will, and the labour force is confined to particular areas. In addition to the collapse of many economic sectors, there is skyrocketing unemployment, and poverty.

According to ILO standards [1], the employment rate decreased in the Palestinian Territory to 41.4 per cent in the 4th quarter of 2008 (PCBS) [2]. In addition, according to the ILO standards, the percentage of persons who do not work, but are seeking jobs increased to 27.9 per cent in the 4th quarter of 2008 (PCBS) [2]. Furthermore, the unemployment rate reached 33.4 per cent in the 4th quarter of 2008 (PCBS) [2]. The unemployment rate among young people (15 to 29) reached 50 per cent in Gaza and 30 per cent in the West Bank (ILO) [3] in 2008. The poverty levels reached 56.6 per cent in 2008 (ILO) [3] and extreme poverty reached a level of 40 per cent in Gaza and 19 per cent in the West Bank (ILO) [3]. Furthermore, per capita GDP stabilized in 2007 at the low level of at US$1,178 (ILO) [3]. This situation restricts national planning, which is subject to outside interference and is complicated by social, economic, and political relations with other nations.

3. Research basic requirementsWe are all aware that there are several essential requirements and elements that must be in place in order to accomplish university research that can affect positively the development of a nation and, specifically, the national economy. These elements include a stable political situation and socio-economic development. In addition, an active national research knowledge system that encompasses all potential university stakeholders, mainly in the private sector and industry needs to be put in place. Furthermore, adequate resources, including well-trained, highly-skilled researchers, funding and laboratory equipment, as well as library services and institutional provision for research should be available. R&D units, doctoral programmes and post-doctoral programmes are needed. In effect, the proactive involvement and participation of the community including both public and private sectors as the main strategic partners is required.

Chapter 8 Analytical and comparative study of the Palestinian research knowledge national system


4. Current Palestinian research knowledge systemThe current Palestinian research knowledge system in the OPT goes back to the 1980s. However, it was organized at the beginning of the twenty-first century, following the establishment of the first Palestinian Ministry of Higher Education. The following paragraphs briefly outline the current major research governance arrangements, stakeholders and centres.

5. The council of scientific research (CSR) The CSR was established by the Ministry of Higher Education (MHE) [4] in 2000, and chaired by the MHE Minister. It was composed of a Vice Chair nominated by the Minister, a Secretary General, the Director General for Scientific Research (SR) at the MHE, Deans of research at the Palestinian universities, and three representatives of research centres registered at MHE. The various tasks and responsibilities of the CSR include:

Working with relevant parties to draft national general policies for scientific research (SR), and setting priorities for SR plans.

Developing human resources in the field of SR in Universities and research centres.

Assisting in the provision of SR national data at regional and international levels.

Specifying what SR priorities should be supported; and promoting the establishment of centres of excellence in the field of research.

Currently, owing to the instability of the political situation, CSR’s activity is very limited.

The Academy of Science and Technology (PALAST) in Palestine is an Independent, public non-profit, non-governmental body established by a presidential decree in 1997 [5]. PALAST is mandated to be the primary science and technology body in the country in charge of providing advice in formulating policies, programmes and projects to support national development. It also participates in the coordination of relevant scientific and technological (S&T) activities. As a result, the Academy constitutes the focal point and acts as an umbrella organization for science and technology [6]. PALAST’s structure is composed of the President and Board of Directors which includes a secretary general, legal adviser, and treasurer. It encompasses human sciences and natural sciences. In addition, PALAST has forty-five Fellows (national distinguished scientists) and nine honorary (Foreign) fellows. PALAST has established a National Science Fund (NSF) which acts as a pool of financial resources, composed of governmental grants, grants coming from the industrial sector, as well as international grants directed at improving R&D in Palestine. NSF’s priority is to improve R&D processes in the national institutes and help the industrial sector to improve its production process and the quality of its products. A percentage of this fund (called the Basic Research Fund) will also be allocated to the establishment of small competitive programmes. PALSAT has produced several publications including a study entitled “Scientific Research in Palestine: Reality, Challenges and Means of Activation and Development” [7]. The study identified the obstacles and main problems affecting the development and promotion of basic and applied scientific research in Palestine. The main obstacles perceived are the political instability and the social and security conditions in the region, as a result of the occupation. Other problems include the scarcity of funds allocated to scientific research;

•

•••


the lack of cooperation and coordination among the stakeholders; and the absence of clear policies and associated strategies and action plans for the relevant national institutions. PALAST’s priorities include research on the following areas: environment (water resources, climate change), health, nutrition, basic research, social sciences, and information and communication technologies.

• The number of specialist research-based non-government organizations (NGOs)

NGOs are currently considered as part of the research institutes, and contribute to research publications and national developments in their specific fields. The following paragraphs will briefly cover some of these NGOs.

• The Palestine economic policy research institute (MAS) [8]

The MAS is an independent, non-profit institution, founded in 1994, and governed by a Board of Trustees consisting of prominent national and regional academics, businessmen and distinguished personalities. The MAS contributes to the policy-making process by conducting economic and social policy research; it evaluates economic and social policies and their impact at different levels in adjusting and reviewing existing policies. The MAS produces several annual publications.

• The applied research institute – Jerusalem (ARIJ) [9]

The ARIJ is a non-profit organization established in 1990, with strategic priorities including Sustainable Agriculture, and Sustainable Resource Management. ARIJ focuses on specific fields, namely, water and environment, natural resources management, agriculture, and the geographic information system. ARIJ published a number of reputable publications attracting 8.5 million hits in 2007 [10]. Furthermore, ARIJ has an extensive network, cooperating with national, regional, and global Governmental bodies, NGOs, Local Authorities, institutions and organizations.

• The land research center (LRC) [11]

The LRC is an independent, non-governmental, non-profit organization, established in 1986 as a branch of the Jerusalem Arab Studies Society [12]. It focuses on land and its degradation, agriculture, and the environment.

• The Palestinian academic society for the study of international affairs (PASSIA) [13]

The PASSIA is an independent, non-profit institution founded in 1987. PASSIA focuses on presenting the Palestinian Question in its national, Arab and international contexts through academic research, dialogue and publication. Furthermore, PASSIA provides a forum for the free expression and analysis of a plurality of Palestinian perspectives and methodology, and strives to develop and clarify its own and others’ understanding of international relations as they affect the Palestinian struggle for justice and peace.



• The Palestinian central bureau of statistics (PCBS) [14]

The PCBD was established in 1993, and periodically provides recent and precise data on topics including: population, housing, political, economic, and social matters, education, and the situation relating to land.

• Research capacities at occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) universities

Palestine (OPT) has currently forty-four higher education institutions including thirteen universities distributed all over the West Bank and Gaza Strip [15]. The first university was established in the mid-1970s. Two are state universities, two are private and the rest are non-governmental, non-profit public universities. All the universities are traditional in that they follow traditional modes of study, except one that follows an open, distance education scheme. These universities provide educational services to 160,000 students, of whom 70,000 are Open University students (06/07 [16]). Graduates numbered 16,206 in 05/06 [17]. The number of Academics (Faculty Members) was 4,964 (06/07). They are composed of 5 per cent full Professors, 12 per cent Associate Professors, 39 per cent Assistant Professors, and 45 per cent Lecturers. Thus, the student to faculty ratio equals 1: 32 (06/07). Each university has its own research deanship and research centres.

In order to demonstrate the capacity for research production at the Palestinian universities, three universities were taken as a sample, namely Al-Quds University (AQU) [18], Birzeit University (BZU) [19], and the Islamic University of Gaza (IUG) [20]. Research publications (restricted to Journal publications) were included. The data were taken from their Annual Reports. The parameters considered included the number of faculty members, the number of Publications in different broad areas, fields or disciplines, coauthors, place of publication, the language of publications, and patents. Accordingly, the publication ratios were calculated in order to compare them with other universities’ publications in the Arab region as reported by UNESCO in 2006 [21].

Table 1 presents this collected data and shows the calculated ratios in the three universities.

One can notice from Table 1 that major research contributions were published in international Journals by the three universities (92 per cent, 90 per cent, and 42 per cent respectively; with an average of 73 per cent). Although 70 per cent of the universities’ enrolled students and graduates are in the fields of Humanities, Arts, Education, and Business [15] faculty members from those fields produce only 10 per cent, 31 per cent, and 29 per cent respectively with an average of 26 per cent. Comparing Research Production Ratios (RPR) with other regional and international countries, the RPR for the three Universities considered was calculated as 0.19, 0.23, and 0.22, respectively with an average of 0.21. These figures are well above other similar countries including Argentina that has 0.129 and Arab Countries that range between 0.019 – 0.172, with an average of 0.052 [21].

Although research is considered in practice as a minor function of the university (the author could not get sufficient evidence to define the research trends at all Palestinian universities, hence the concentration on the three universities under consideration. In addition, the author had not found any document that listed strategic plans, priorities


for research or budgets for overseeing projects, equipment, or research documentation. However, a limited budget was available at universities to cover attending conferences, with very limited funds to cover research projects [22]. Incentives which are provided by universities include support services, and facilitation; financial support; the funding of researchers to attend conferences and share their results; to accomplish surveys and/or experiments; to reduce academic loads; and to provide for promotion and sabbatical leave. The universities’ research capacities and laboratories are rarely mentioned in the public arena.

It is clear from the foregoing that Palestinian scientific research is as yet underdeveloped. Several reasons can be identified. These include political instability, lack of funding resources for research, lack of Ph.D. and post-doctoral programmes and lack of guidance and strategic direction from a national research effort. Indeed, one of the reasons for the lack of funding is precisely this lack of top-level commitment.

The national research knowledge system is a fragmented one, with no specific strategy for research being available at most of the universities and research institutions, as well as at the level of other research stakeholders. In addition, research priorities are not clearly identified by the Universities’ Research faculties. A small portion of the academics is intensely active in research, and regularly produce results. Their contributions to national development need to be investigated. Some initiatives and scattered projects are available at most universities and research centres. However, they are neither part of a programme nor coordinated with their national counterparts. Furthermore, there are no national

Table 1. A sample of research production ratios by the Palestinian universities.



agencies or foundations whose specific aim is to provide funding and coordination, and to bridge the gap between research stakeholders, or to attract foreign research and the interest of international R&D firms. The cooperation between research stakeholders might be considered very weak. It can be demonstrated that international cooperation plays a major role in supporting research (equipment and funding, access to up to date laboratories, documentation, and scientific databases; in addition it supports the mobility of staff and students. These were demonstrated by the involvement of the university in programmes including Tempus [23], Erasmus Mundus [24], etc.

6. Future directionOn a national level, the Palestinian Ministry of Planning (MOP) [25] has recently published a strategy for implementing a vision of the future Palestinian state: “A Knowledge-based economy”. CSR should have the mandate to assess the strategic priorities for conducting research in Palestinian universities that should relate to Palestine’s needs. In addition, CSR must develop policies to encourage such research to take place and to provide funding to support such research from government and donors. Furthermore, CSR should establish and strengthen industry-university cooperation.

On a university Level, the university should consider research as a major function and set aside a fixed budget for scientific research. A university research board or similar body needs to be established, to foster, improve, and monitor the university research environment.

The various scientific fields that should be addressed as national research priorities include: (i) Information Technology; (ii) Agriculture; (iii) the Environment; (iv) Water Resources, and (v) Alternative Energy.

Contacts websites:[1] www.ILO.org [2] www.pcbs.gov.ps [3] http://www.ilo.org/global/Regions/Arab_states/lang--en/index.htm (Report of the Director-General on the situation of workers of the occupied Arab Territories, 2008).[4] www.moe.gov.ps [5] www.palestineacademy.org [6] www.palestineacademy.org[7] www.palestineacademy.org/publications [8] www.pal-econ.org [9] www.arij.org [10] ARIJ 2007-2008 annual report.[11] www.lrcj.org [12] www.orienthouse.org [13] www.passia.org [14] www.pcbs.gov.ps [15] www.aqac.mohe.gov.ps

http://www.ILO.org

http://www.pcbs.gov.ps

http://www.ilo.org/global/Regions/Arab_states/lang--en/index.htm

http://www.moe.gov.ps

http://www.palestineacademy.org

http://www.palestineacademy.org

http://www.palestineacademy.org/publications

http://www.pal-econ.org

http://www.arij.org

http://www.lrcj.org

http://www.orienthouse.org

http://www.passia.org

http://www.pcbs.gov.ps

http://www.aqac.mohe.gov.ps


[16] Ministry of Education and Higher Education publication, 2007.[17] Ministry of Education and Higher Education publication, 2006.[18] www.alquds.edu [19] www.birzeit.edu [20] www.iugaza.edu.ps [21] Draft Regional Report on Arab Countries, Symposium on Comparative Analysis of National Research Systems, UNESCO, 16 to 18 January 2008. Paris, France.[22] www.ppu.edu [23] ec.europa.eu/tempus [24] ec.europa.eu/education/programmes/erasmus_mundus [25] http://www.mop.gov.ps/

Contact details:

Arafeh LabibAssociate Professor,Computer Engineering Department,Engineering Faculty,Al-Quds University,P.O. Box 20002,Abu Dies, Jerusalem,Israel.e-mail : [email protected]

http://www.alquds.edu

http://www.birzeit.edu

http://www.iugaza.edu.ps

http://www.ppu.edu

http://www.mop.gov.ps


4PART

Dimensions of knowledge systems: policies, governance, infrastructure, human resources, research output,

cooperation agreements, tensions and dynamics

Chapter 9Building a knowledge economy: issues on financing higher education

Winston Dookeran

Chapter 10Rethinking governance – trends, policies, policy options

Irena Kuzmanoska; Zoran Popovski

Chapter 11Impact of temporary labour migration on the demand for education:

implications for human resource development in the PhilippinesTereso Tullao; John Paolo Rivera


Winston Dookeran, Trinidad and Tobago

Chapter 9Building a knowledge economy: Issues on financing higher education

AbstractThis study looks at building knowledge economies and examines the role of higher education in building such societies in today’s globally competitive environment. It explores the external benefits (externalities) of education in a macro setting and the shift in the state’s role from central control to the provision of financial incentives. It argues for a reform programme for higher education, an enabling regulatory framework and the need for new models of financing of higher education. The paper looks at worldwide trends in the finance of higher education, and findings of an OECD/UNESCO study (2002) on developing countries. Various financing proposals are identified in the search for more accessibility to tertiary education, and the paper discusses issues of political governance and challenges to academic values as the university competes in the marketplace.

1. IntroductionKnowledge is today a major driving force in development, fueled by changes in the globalized economy and the new information era. The building of a knowledge economy has become possible due to the creation of knowledge via research and advances in technology, investments in education and a new openness to innovation. At the heart of this impetus is the search for competitiveness and sustainable development. Investment in knowledge infrastructure, including human capital (HC), offers a new wave in economic restructuring, with ‘higher value added products with closer customer linkages’ (World Bank Institute, 2007). Finland was able to transform from a natural base economy into a knowledge-based economy in a short period, ranking recently as N° 1 in the World Economic Forum’s competitive index. Investments in education and information systems have been credited with this progress.

Higher education is now at the centre stage of strategies for sustained growth and inclusive development. Coupled with a regime for innovation and Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) infrastructure, investment in human capital has high ‘development dividends’ as it prepares an economy to meet the challenges of competition in today’s integrated global economy. In an aggregate sense, education influences the macroeconomy through its impact on productivity and technical change as it affects economic growth. Changes in the competitive structure increase the development’s potential, while the adaptation to an innovative system advances social cohesion in inclusiveness in the well-being of society.

Chapter 9 Building a knowledge economy: issues on financing higher education


A recent World Bank publication argues that a country’s competitive advantage in the global economy is linked to the converging impacts of globalization, knowledge as a main driver of growth and the information revolution: “The proportion of goods in international trade with a medium-high or high level of technology content rose from 33 per cent in 1976 to 54 per cent in 1996” (World Bank, 2002, p.8).

Opportunities are emerging from these challenges. Knowledge has become a primary factor of production. Building knowledge societies requires a sound incentive-based macroeconomic regime, a modern Information and Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure, a competitive innovation system and a high quality of its human resources. The contribution of tertiary education is vital to the emergence of innovation systems and to the development of human resources.

One of the main messages of the World Bank report cited above is that “the state has a responsibility to put in place an enabling framework that encourages tertiary institutions to be more innovative and more responsive to the needs of a globally competitive knowledge economy and the changing labour market requirements for advanced human capital”. Three arguments that justify a government’s support for funding universities are the existence of externalities from tertiary education, equity issues and the connective role of tertiary education in the education system as a whole.

There is a debate as to whether education is a public good or a quasi-public good. In the orthodox definition, education, while having the attributes of a public good, does not meet the test of Say’s law, viz demand creates its own supply, and education does confer private gains to individuals. But education is a significant generator of external benefits and individuals do not capture all the rewards of education. Indeed, there are significant externalities in the production of education as the overall contribution of tertiary education to economic growth goes beyond the income and employment gains accruing to individuals. These are crucial to knowledge-driven economic and social development, and permit workers to use new technology and boost productivity.

Apart from its contribution to economic growth, higher education has broad economic, fiscal and labour market effects. There are linkages and spillover effects from the clustering of human capital alongside leading technology firms as exemplified by technology intensive groups in Silicon Valley in California, Bangalore in India, Shanghai in China, Campinas in São Paulo, Brazil and in similar groupings in East Asia and Finland. There are various studies that have measured the positive correlation between increases in educational levels and consumption, tax base and the reduced dependence on medical and social welfare services. There are also non-economic externalities in promoting greater social cohesion, and appreciation of diversity in societies. The World Bank UNESCO publication, Higher Education in Developing Countries: Peril and Promise concluded that “tertiary education is important in building capacity and reducing poverty” (Global Joint Task Force, 2000).

According to Nobel Laureate (2001) Joseph E. Stiglitz (Nobel Prize lecture, 2001), “there are no prescriptions for how a country creates such a culture ‘of knowledge’…but government does have a role – a role in education, in encouraging the kind of creativity and risk that the scientific entrepreneurship requires, in creating the institutions that facilitate ideas being brought into fruition, and a regulatory and tax environment that rewards this kind of activity”. This is a new challenge – a challenge of offering financial incentives in higher


education – and goes hand in hand with the old challenges of promoting quality, efficiency and equity. The rise of market forces and the recurring fiscal austerity facing governments have reduced the reliance of the traditional state control model to impose reform and have introduced a flexibility that relies on regulations and incentives.

2. Forces for change in higher educationIn the past, the dominant role of governments in the financing and provision of higher education was easily translated into a relationship characterized by a high degree of centralized control or by a great deal of institutional autonomy. Today, there is much more complex interplay of forces that rely on state regulations and financial incentives; participation and partnerships with industry, civil society and professional associations; and competition between higher education providers. (See Diagram 1).

Diagram 1. Complex interplay of forces for change in tertiary education

An initial step is to define a reform programme within a coherent policy framework. Such a higher education development strategy should comprise answers to what type of system that will contribute to growth in a knowledge-based economy, what are the roles of the institutions within the higher education system, and how could the new technologies be harnessed by individuals and enterprises? Several countries have attempted this exercise including New Zealand (The Tertiary Education Green Paper - 1998); France (Plan for the University of the Third Millennium - 2000); South Africa (Report on the Council

PG

Source: The World Bank, Constructing Knowledge Societies: New Challenges for Tertiary Education, 2002 modified by the author to include in the vortex, Political Governance (PG)



of Higher Education - 2001) and India (India as a Knowledge Superpower: Strategy for Transformation - 2001).

Steps to design an enabling regulatory framework will require, in most cases, legislative measures, consensus building mechanisms on cost sharing, quality assurance mechanisms and financial rules and controls. In this context, government funding will remain the major source of financing for higher education in developing countries. ‘Negotiated’ budgets based on historical trends may now be replaced with financial incentive formulae that steer higher education institutions toward compliance with quality, cutting edge research, and efficiency and equity goals. Funding may be linked to performance, but it may also be linked to the mobilization of additional resources through increased cost sharing.

Some universities have established competitive funds to promote quality improvements. Under such systems, institutions may bid for extrabudgetary financial resources that are linked to proposals aimed at specific internal policy changes. Such policy changes may be within the faculties to help define their missions, market niches, development objectives and action plans to achieve these objectives. The process must be transparent. Successful organizations even in the academic world are those that challenge and re-invent themselves “in the pursuit of more effective ways of responding to the needs of their clients and stakeholders”. Dr David Kemp, Minister of Education of Australia, in a speech to the OECD thematic review of tertiary education (OECD, 2001) “Strategic Developments in Higher Education” had this to say: “The uncertainty of the future underlines the importance of a policy framework which gives as much flexibility as possible to universities and students, and highlights the importance of building institutions that are responsive to change”.

There is a growing recognition that the cost of higher education must be shared in a more equitable way among the various stakeholders. Higher education opportunities should be accessible to all qualified persons and the state must play a crucial role in ensuring that no one is prevented from studying by lack of financial resources. As such, any shifting of costs to students must include parallel programmes of scholarship and loan programmes that cover both direct and indirect costs (foregone earnings). This raises key issues of equity and management. The World Bank conducted an international review of student loan programmes which highlighted serious shortcomings on the long term viability of these programmes. The World Bank report concluded that student loan schemes should meet the following conditions: (i) an appropriate marketing strategy; (ii) transparent targeting to the most deserving students (academic and social criteria), (iii) close supervision of academic performance of the student; (iv) interest rate and subsidy rate to protect financial sustainability of the scheme; and (v) efficient management of the scheme. Better results may be achieved when the programmes are financed and administered (with enforceable guidelines) by the commercial banks. The challenges of ‘borderless’ education across institutions and programme types – life-long and part-time – requires a flexible management approach.


3. Financing education: some findings At the Salzburg Seminar, 2002, Tony White referred to Ireland’s phenomenal economic growth of 8 per cent from 1994 to 2001. White affirms, “There is no one factor responsible for this growth, but education policy … Education in Ireland has been viewed as an investment rather than as an economic drain. Over the years it has made a successful transition from elite to a mass education system; fully 50 per cent of 18 to 24 year olds attend university … Irish society believes in the value of education. Thus, higher education receives 81 per cent of its funding from Government, 15 per cent from fees”. There are no empirically tested rules on the ratio of expenditure on higher education to gross domestic product (GDP), but what is clear is that the development of human capital is highly connected to growth and quality of life.

The OECD/UNESCO, 2002 report provides an analysis of the World Education Indicators (WEI) programme that was launched by UNESCO, OECD and the World Bank in 1997. The countries in the programme were Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Jamaica, Jordan, Malaysia, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, the Russian Federation, Tunisia, Thailand, Uruguay and Zimbabwe. In its Introduction, the report affirms “education is an investment in the collective future of societies and nations, rather than simply the future success of individuals”. Comparing the growth patterns between WEI and OECD countries, the findings support the hypothesis that, in the early stages of industrialization, investment in capital is important, but as development deepens the role of human capital as a strong driver of economic growth takes over.

While investment in education promotes sustainable economic growth, it can help equalize social disparities. One of the key findings of this study is that “the goals of expanding education systems and maintaining [sustainable] equity are inextricably linked to questions of educational finance”. Demands on education and demands for educational opportunities are growing in WEI countries. The resources required to meet these demands are highly dependent on macroeconomic stability. Apart from the issue of downturns, whether cyclical or contagious, the share of tax-based revenue as a percentage of GDP is also significant. In China this ratio is merely 6 per cent while it is 40 per cent in the Netherlands. This restricts the public sector capacity to fund education expenditure in many WEI countries. Combining public and private expenditure may help but it may still be too small. In Indonesia this amounts to 1.8 per cent of GDP compared to 9.9 per cent of GDP in Jamaica. World Bank estimates that an appropriate range of investment in education as a percentage of gross domestic product is between 4 and 6 per cent, of which higher education would generally be between 15 to 20 per cent.

There is a wide array of mechanisms used in WEI countries for financing education. The following table from the OECD report succinctly describes the situation.

The issue of financing of higher education is linked to the issue of governance. State financial support for private education varies, ranging from 4 per cent in the United States of America (USA) to 12 per cent in France. Among WEI countries, governments in Chile and India are the biggest supporters of non-state education provision, although only about 10 per cent of that support goes to tertiary level institutions. Since the cost of tertiary level education can skyrocket, it has been argued that fees are justifiable for this level of education but the level of private costs and the potential for excluding qualified students are important and sensitive policy concerns.

Chapter 9 Building a know

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Mechanism Goal/s Constraint/s Country

Direct public funding of private schools

Promote equity. Schools may increase fee or charge other fees.

Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Philippines.

Community grants /community franchising

Promote equity. Improve management capacity.

Concerns about sustainability. Brazil, China, Zimbabwe.

Grants / scholarships Promote equity. Targeting costs and difficulties. School may increase fee or charge other fees.

Brazil, Chile, China, Jordan, Malaysia, Zimbabwe.

Student loans Promote equity and / or cost recovery.

Difficult to target, difficult to recover, often acts as a subsidy.

Brazil, Chile, Jamaica, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Zimbabwe.

Targeted bursaries / school improvement funds

Promote access and equity. Support local decision making.

May not reach target population. Social stratification. May be disincentive to schools.

Chile, China, India, Paraguay.

Vouchers Promote choice, equity and education quality.

May result in selection practices. Socially divisive.

Chile.

Matching grants / social funds Promote equity. Improve management capacity.

May have negative impact on poor students.

Brazil, China, India, Philippines.

Source: OECD / UNESCO -Financing Education-Investment and Returns Analysis of World Economic Indicators, (2002 edition)

Mechanisms for public financing of education in WEI countries


Small states warrant different priorities. Partnerships with neighbouring small states have seen the establishment of a ‘network’ university. Strategic choices as to offerings are influenced by the countries’ critical human skill requirements. Partnerships with external providers of tertiary education, including distance education, have been on the traditional model. This approach is being overtaken by market developments, as cost incentives push foreign universities to locate special faculties in distant places that could be attractive to students and faculty. At the same time, franchise partnerships are being developed between local private providers of university training and marketing arms of established institutions.

4. Perspectives in higher educationBruce Johnstone discusses the finance and management agenda of tertiary education in the context of five themes: expansion and diversification of enrolments, participation rates and number and types of institutions; fiscal pressure as reflected in overcrowding, poorly paid faculty, and major deficiencies in the university’s hardware and software installations; the orientation towards the market in search of non-governmental revenues; the demand for greater accountability by all stakeholders; and the demand for greater quality and efficiency – more rigour, more relevance and more learning (Johnstone et al., 1998). The issue of ‘commoditization’ refers to the conversion of education outputs into market products. It is argued that the production of high quality learning materials at low unit costs will bring education to all. The newsletter of UNESCO’s Education Sector (October-December 2002) states “In this way, teachers all over the world can be freed from the chore of reinventing the wheel. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has shown the way by making its own web material available free. Let’s hope this heralds a worldwide movement to commoditize education for the common well”. Another sign of the way things are going is that Apollo and Sylvan learning (firms that sell higher education) are quoted on the USA stock exchange.

These agenda issues provide a framework that can be used to do empirical work for educational planning.

In a Keynote Address at the Salzburg Seminar, November 2002, on The Funding of Higher Education Johnstone elaborated further on certain trends in higher education worldwide: rising costs, institutional austerity, overcrowding, rising tuition fees, deterioration of quality, limitations on capacity and on accessibility, deterioration of faculty morale and diminished confidence in government by the public (Johnstone, 2002). The per student cost of higher education increases in response to high enrolment pressures, the move towards ‘massification’, and the surge in faculty ambition. This means that there will be higher frontiers in the production possibility curve in education. Is there any innovation that will lower production costs in higher education? Information technology, yet to be fully explored, may have the potential. For now, higher education costs are to be met by revenue increases from taxpayers, parents, students, donors (philanthropists), clients, entrepreneurs, business and consumers.

Technological change has posed a real danger of a growing digital gap among and between nations. This new ‘divide’ was clearly illustrated in the World Bank study as follows: “sub- Saharan African countries together have one internet user per 5,000 populations;



in Europe and North America this proportion is one user for every six inhabitants”. Within countries, access to Internet is heavily skewed in favour of high-income families and there may even be a ‘digital gender gap’. A well functioning ICT system could reduce administrative and management cost, improve the quality of instruction and learning, and reap the economic gains to better access information cross-campus and across the globe. This is an opportunity for future funding by forging new university partnerships with business, manufacturing and the extractive industries. Long-term finance instruments, either through the capital market or multilateral financial institutions can be employed for capital funding. In which case, the state takes on the burden of such repayments and such finance programs are assessed from a national and regional perspective. In light of the finance limitations of the state, multinational corporations with a stake and long- term interest in countries may be approached to be partners in the long term financing of higher education. Since 1994, the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) has included higher education on the list of services to be privatized.

In striving for financial viability, policy strategies are required. For instance, one must either work towards greater efficiency and/or supplement public revenue with non-governmental revenues. The introduction of revenue supplementation, also known as ‘cost sharing’ can take a variety of forms such as: charging/raising tuition fees, increasing other fees, and freezing grants and other subsidies. Scotland has replaced tuition with loans to be repaid after graduation as a contribution to an endowment fund; Australia has adopted a higher education contribution scheme to be repaid after graduation (students may get 25 per cent reduction if they pay upfront – which gives the appearance of a discount to those who can pay – or it may be seen as an incentive). Makarere University in Uganda has been heralded as witnessing a ‘quiet revolution’ where student enrolment expanded, quality standards prevailed and tuition fees have been systematically introduced.

Restructuring at Makarere had three central and interrelated elements: implementing alternative financing strategies, installing new management structures and introducing demand-driven courses. Makarere University encouraged privately sponsored students, commercializing service units and institutionalizing consultancy arrangements. David Court describes the results as dramatic. In the space of five years, tuition fees were raised from zero per cent to 70 per cent, and 30 per cent of the running costs of the university were internally generated Much of this achievement can be attributed to steady improvement in the country’s macroeconomic performance and ‘government’s willingness to respect university autonomy’. Within the institution, there was imaginative leadership that had “faith in the benefits of a market orientation and professional and participatory management, and their unambiguous sense of ownership of the reform process” (Court, 1999).

The issue of tuition fees and cost sharing is not value free or politically neutral. Those promoting it claim equity or fairness, (with parallel loans and grants), greater capacity hence more equity, improved quality of teaching and sustainability of finances. Finances will be volatile during public finance cycles. Those in opposition argue a loss of equality, the absence of a level playing field (some students have to earn incomes while studying), loss of public control and a sub-ideal state. In order to be acceptable, tuition fees must supplement, not supplant, public revenue or the increase in enrolments may not happen, and financial assistance programmes must run in parallel. Also, increases in fees should be modest and regular. Some institutions have linked increases in fees to productivity


expenditure, like better-equipped classrooms and laboratories, Internet access, new offerings and savings.

The design of a tuition fee policy is an inexact science. Should students bear the cost of research or only teaching? What proportion of one income (or foregone income) should be spent on fees? The OECD report states “in a majority of countries, the minimum tuition fee falls below 10 per cent per capita, although it reaches one quarter in Chile and Uruguay and about half of GDP per capita in Thailand. How are selections for grants and loans to be made? In today’s multi-institution scenario (private, public, corporate, levels of higher education institutions) do financial support systems and credentials need to be portable? What are the goals of tuition fee policy: increase university budgets, increase educational opportunities, widen the participation, improve accountability and quality of institutions, promote responsibility of students, and build closer links between the universities and the labour market? Is tuition fee a tax deduction and/or public support? Must tuition fee be abolished at all levels?

Endowment and pension funds provide financial resources that need to be managed. Foundations and university endowments have traditionally been invested in government securities and equity holdings. In the USA, investment portfolios aim to ‘shoot for profits even in bad times’ by investing in hedge funds. Universities appoint fund managers to implement a strategy for investment. Such managers determine the level of exposure and risk profile of the portfolio of investments. The returns to these investments represent an income stream, and the university must have the expertise to assess performance and advice on preferred investment strategy.

Most universities set themselves an entrepreneurial mandate. Consulting firms spin-off university academics – this may apply more readily to programmes with a high ‘technical’ component, like engineering, science, economics, medicine, management etc. The humanities do not easily offer themselves to market-based solutions in attracting new funding – sometimes with profit-sharing arrangements between faculty and university, at other time on a purely private basis. In a period of rapid change, new training opportunities emerge as in the transition economies or in the information industry. Decision- making at universities is not geared to respond timely to these rapid changes in the market, hence an entrepreneurial mandate emerges. In discharging this mandate, universities get opportunities to increase and diversify their sources of income, to explore new forms of thought and training and to take on an entrepreneurial outlook. There is also a downside as all departments may not have the same market power and there could be a diversion from the traditional canons of academic responsibility and integrity.

Philanthropy is big business in the USA, prompting higher education leaders to emulate the USA experience which provides another avenue to supplement public funds. Such contributions have thrived on favourable tax treatment but the driving force is the existence of a culture of philanthropy. In many cases alumni associations provide the organizational platform for university fundraising activities. Such activities help in the expansion of capital programmes, although there has been a recent trend to fund major areas of socially desirable research in areas like medicine, genetic engineering and biotechnology.

The reform of higher education financing was alluded to earlier in this chapter. Such reforms would include performance and incentive budgeting, expenditure reforms



that include outsourcing of non-academic services, compensation reforms that include manpower planning systems, and devolution in spending authorities. Such a reform exercise may include radical restructuring of the system of higher education that may yield lay-offs, early retirements and reassignment. Universities are known to resist change, and, more so, radical change. It is an exercise in political economy, where the constituencies of ‘winners’ in the change process must gain influence over the ‘losers’. A major change agent in the university setting lies in the information revolution, as scholars have instant access to other scholars thus widening opportunities and competition at the same time.

5. Issues of political governance and the market placeThe political governance of higher education “… has become an important issue as systems and institutions struggle to deal with new external and internal demands” (Amaral et al., 2006). These demands are reflected in changes in management and administrative structures for higher education. There also can be changes in performance that aligns education with national development, and in new models of public accountability resulting from rising demand for new and better education.

In addressing these issues – the distribution of power and the equilibrium between ‘winners and losers’ among the stakeholders – matters of politics come to the fore. The forces for change in tertiary education, mentioned previously in this chapter, describe the links between regulations and incentives, participation and partnership and societal pressures. At the vortex is the issue of political governance as the core process that shapes the environment.

Economic growth and development are structurally linked to the knowledge economy, as merit-based, equitable and efficient education is essential to economic transformation. Inevitably, decisions on these matters are made in the political process that has become more complex in today’s world. (Dookeran and Malaki, 2009, Chapter 3).

Derek Bok, former President of Harvard University, is the author of a book entitled Universities in the Market Place in which he suggested that “universities show signs of excessive commercialism in every aspect of their work” but he is hopeful that the trend is not yet irreversible (Bok, 2003). He is probably right when he stated, “In higher education, the cards are stacked against any institution that lacks an established reputation and a lot of money”. Bok sees a major conflict between the commercialization of higher education and the need to protect the integrity of research and to preserve educational values. Several scholars, he claims, have linked ‘the recent growth of money-making activity to a lack of purpose in the university’. Bok does not agree: rather he argues “that a university must have a clear sense of values needed to pursue its goals with a high degree of quality and integrity”.

The rise of market forces in higher education has opened up the doors for additional cost sharing avenues, but at a cost of turning universities into ‘knowledge factories’. According to Stanley Aronowitz, “… the learning enterprise has become subject to the growing power of administration, which more and more responds not to faculty and students, except at the margin, but to political and market forces that claim sovereignty over higher education” (Aronowitz, 2000). The marketplace is now encroaching on the work of the


universities, as it has done in hospitals, cultural institutions that have been thought to serve other values. These are bold assertions and “a mute reminder that something of irreplaceable value may get lost in the relentless growth of commercialization. Cheng, Y.C. (2000) in a comment “Beyond Economics” stated that the “foremost challenge is to manage commercialization to rise above short-term pressures and to take a more ethical stance towards education, a long-term strategic view”.

The values of the university, reform in social justice, social equity, preservation and promotion of cultural values, generation of new knowledge must not falter on the mantra of commercialization.

Derek Bok argues that commercialization may undermine academic standards, by encouraging appointments of professors who can bring corporate funding, or by restricting the full sharing of knowledge, reducing adherence to ethical behaviours, and introducing opportunities for private gains. In this environment, new challenges emerge for preserving educational and academic values, and new conflicts of interest will arise in protecting the integrity of research.

Trinidad and Tobago fast forward agenda(Taken directly from fastforward.tt,Ministry of Public Information, Government of the Republic of Trinidad & Tobago)

Trinidad and Tobago‘s fastforward agenda is all about transforming the country into a knowledge-based society by 2008. Government working with the public and private sectors has produced an exciting roadmap that charts a clear and determined course to an online society and a knowledge-based economy. fastforward provides far reaching strategies for the development of a connected country that will adapt, flourish and prosper in the new global information society.

National ICT Vision

Trinidad and Tobago is in a prominent position in the global information society through real and lasting improvements in social, economic and cultural development caused by deployment and usage of information and communication technology.

National Objectives

Our Connectivity Agenda will:

Provide all citizens in our country with affordable Internet access.

Focus on the development of our children, and adult skills to ensure a sustainable solution and a vibrant future.

Promote citizen trust, access, and interaction through good governance.

••

•



Maximize the potential within all of our citizens, and accelerate innovation, to develop a knowledge-based society Connected - Committed - Competitive - Creative - Caring - Community.

Towards developed nation status - our goals:

Sustaining strong economic growth.

Creating a competent, productive and sophisticated workforce.

Improving efficiencies and service quality in public sector agencies.

Improving education at all levels and increasing science and technology literacy through cutting-edge information and knowledge.

Improving social equity.

Helping people become information sensitive.

ReferencesAmaral, A.; Jones, G.A. and Karseth, B. 2006. Governing Higher Education: National

Perspectives on Institutional Governance. Springer 2006.

Aronowitz, S. 2000. The Knowledge Factory: Dismantling the Corporate University and Creating the Higher Learning. Boston: Beacon Press.

Bok, D. 2003. Universities in the Marketplace: The Commercialization of Higher Education. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Cheng, Y.C. 2000. Beyond Economics. In: Special Issue on Education: The Last Frontier for Profit, 37. November.

Court, D. 1999. Financing Higher Education in Africa: Makarere: the Quiet Revolution. Washington, DC: The World Bank. September, 1999.

Dookeran, W.; Malaki, A. 2009. Leadership and Governance in Small States. Published by VDM Verlag Dr Muller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, 2009.

Global Joint Task Force. 2000. Higher Education in Developing Countries: Peril and Promise. Washington, D.C: The World Bank.

Johnstone, D.B. 2002. Worldwide Trends in the Financing and Management of Higher Education. Keynote address, Salzburg Seminar. November, 2002.

Johnstone, D. B.; Arora, A.; and Experton, W. 1998. The Financing and Management of Higher Education: A Status Report on World Wide Reforms. Washington, DC: The World Bank.

Muller, A. and Murtagh, T. (eds.), Higher Education for Sale. In: Education Today, the Newsletter of UNESCO’s Education Sector, October-December 2002. Paris, UNESCO.

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Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). 2001. Thematic Review of Early Childhood Education and Care Policy: Australian Background Report. Commissioned by the Australian Government 23 March 2001.

OECD/UNESCO. 2002 edition. Financing Education-Investment and Returns; In: Analysis of World Economic Indicators. Paris, 2002.

Salzburg Seminar. 2002. The Funding of Higher Education: A Record of Universities Project Symposium. 20-24 November 2002.

World Bank. 2002. Constructing Knowledge Societies: New Challenges for Tertiary Education. Washington, D.C: The World Bank. p. 8.

World Bank Institute 2006. Finland as a Knowledge Economy. Elements of Success and Lessons Learnt. Dahlman, C.; Routti, J. and Ylä-Anttila, P. (eds.), Washington, DC.

Contact details:

Winston Dookeran, Development Economist, Visiting Scholar, United Nations University, World Institute for Development Economics Research, (UNU WIDER), Helsinki Finland. e-mail: [email protected]


Chapter 10Rethinking governance – Trends, policies, policy options

Irena Kuzmanoska and Zoran Popovski, Republic of Macedonia


1. Higher education and research policy analysis – Macro-level perspective

The Macedonian higher education system is in a state of flux, coming to terms with turbulent times often resulting from the increase in scale and the widening of client groups, coupled with major changes in the modes of coordination of central and institutional government, and the higher education and research policy objectives of the national government. The overall political climate, in terms of political change and a new political landscape, provides the basis for the policy implementation and formation of long-term and comprehensive reform. When analyzing the effects of the implementation at a macro-level of national higher education policies, it is clear that the various civil servants and successive ministers did not share the same interests, values, political ideology and beliefs. As a result political backup and attention were lost and discrepancies between the policies implemented and the policies adopted emerged. Higher education and research policies were modified as a result of revised or abandoned objectives and diluted expectations. While the overall policy of reform to develop and improve higher education and research remains the same, the demands and conflicts associated with political power vary.

Cerich and Sabatier (1986) have discussed the question of the difficulty of implementing higher education reforms in comparison with other sectors in society. This finding is relevant for the Macedonian context. Ambiguous and multiple goals, a bottom-heavy sub-system, and new functions to be addressed, are all specific policy objectives which are often disputed and contested. The implementation of reforms in higher education and research policy can be characterized as ‘a moving target’, caught up in the ‘top-down’ versus ‘bottom-up’ perspective, with an awareness of the strengths and weaknesses of each approach, and of the efforts to create a synthesis. The areas for discussion range from negotiation of policies, to understanding what can be labeled as ‘democratic’ and ‘not democratic’, to consideration of the core and the periphery of the policy recommendations (Gornitzka et al., 2005). However, the level of participation of academics in the development of structural changes is unclear, as is the interaction of the mechanisms which establish the key policies at system level. The debate between those who wish to reform from the ‘top down’ and those who argue for a ‘bottom-up’ approach is still ongoing and further delays the establishment of a unified approach, although it may create alternative hybrid approaches.

The change in social and economic reality over time is another hampering factor. National higher education policy is not isolated from other national policies, and is affected by public


sector reform programmes, economic policy and other policies with efficiency objectives. As Hooghe and Marks (2001) argue, policy-making is becoming increasingly complex: actors move between different levels of actions and authority is dispersed across multiple tiers. These multi-actor/multi-layer aspects define the national higher education system in terms of a set of interrelationships within the old and new environment.

Amaral et al., (2002) assert that broad system-level reforms of higher education, particularly the reforms which change the relationship between higher education and the state have direct implications for institutional governance. These have frequently involved state-imposed reforms of governance arrangements. These governance structures impact upon the current and future outlook of the institutions and alter the relationships between academics, students, and external interests.

1.1 From government to governance – the levels of interaction

This shift in the national context can be analyzed through the lens of the respective reforms in the higher education sector and in research, and their impact on the relationship between the Government and higher education. Several factors have ushered in new patterns of governance and institutional arrangements: governmental steering at a distance, the increased authority of stakeholders, an extension of institutional autonomy and the growing presence of the market in higher education. Such changes are frequently designated in terms of ‘new public management’. The huge reforms in Macedonia and the reform agenda can be usefully viewed in the context of the following methodological dimensions of the study:

Use of mechanisms corresponding to Burton Clarks’ (1983) triangle – authority, oligarchy of academics and market forces i.e. competition for resources.

Hierarchical leadership by university heads (Shimank et al., 1999; Leišytè, 2007).

The influence of stakeholders (Enders, 2002; Leišytè, 2007).

The study comprised an analysis of the policy process based on a framework addressing a broad set of factors deemed important for different aspects of policy-making in the higher education, science and research area.

Changes in the co-ordination of the public sector, in particular the external and internal governance of higher education sector and research, indicate the shift “from government to governance” (de Boer et al., 2007). The analysis of the higher education and research governance system, and the changes, utilizes Clarks’ triangle as a point of departure. In relation to the triangle of coordination where “the extreme of one form and a minimum of the other two, and locations within the triangle represent combinations of the three elements in different degrees” (Clark, 1983:142), the model provides insights into the power balance of the state, the universities and the market. Clark’s triangle of coordination particularly highlights the growth in influence of the market. Cries for “more market and less government” have had the effect of increasing the institutional autonomy of the universities and have increased sensitivity to stakeholders’ demands through market mechanisms (Orr, 2005). On the other hand, as Meek (2002:69) affirms, market orientation and centralized state control have proved to be not mutually exclusive, but rather to be the opposite ends of a continuum of higher education coordination. It should be noted, however, that the infusion of the market reconstitutes the relationship between the state

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Chapter 10 Rethinking governance – trends, policies, policy options


and the universities rather than having the free market as a final goal. The introduction of the market principle as a type of intervention contributes to the enhancement of state coordination.

Questions arose concerning the level of intervention in public authorities, and how far they can be seen as regulative, centralizing, decentralizing, facilitative, active or passive (Kogan and Marton 2000:93). The changing role of the state and its actual involvement in higher education is further analyzed through the ‘facilitatory state’ and the ‘interventionary state’ (Neave and Van Vugh, 1991, Goedegebuure et al., 1994). According to Goedegebuure et al., (1994:5), this concept of ‘facilitatory state’ refers to a government underwriting higher education as an opportunity for those who are qualified to gain access to higher learning, without actually directing policies at the heart of academia, such as in patterns of participation, internal governance, academic programme development and authority. On the other hand, the ‘interventionary state-concept’ refers to a government, which is actively involved in student output, the internal affairs of the higher education institution and in the relationship between the institution and its environment.

Our understanding of the relationship between the state and the universities has been greatly shaped by Neave’s framing and naming of the ‘remote steering’ activities of the ‘evaluative state’ (Neave, 1988; Neave and van Vught, 1991). Neave has directed attention to the strengthened middle layers between ministries and university faculties which fit in the interstices between the state, the academic oligarchy, and the market forces of Clark’s (1983) triangle model. The later addition of the “managerial or hierarchical self-guidance and the stakeholderism” (Enders, 2002:76) mechanisms extend the list of forces and actors in the governance regime beyond Clark’s triangle.

How does the university system of the former Yugoslavia and now Macedonia, which was organized in the past on a self-governance model placing it somewhere between a voluntary association and a confederation (Clark, 1983; Clark, 2004) respond to the winds of change?

1.2 Governance fit for overthrow or building on the past?

Macedonia, as a member of the Yugoslav Federation, was moulded by a variation of Socialism grounded in the principles of worker self-determination. As part of the Yugoslav Federation, each Republic and self-managing community exercised responsibility for the policy, organization and development of its education system (Mandic, 1992:815). An additional framework, with particular emphasis on the area of higher education, was provided by federal policy. The most important issue within this overall framework was the high degree of independence and autonomy of individual faculties. Each faculty was a separate legal entity, dividing the large university into smaller and potentially less threatening parts. What is the ‘unifier’ of this agglomeration of independent faculties which often functions in splendid isolation (Baumgartl, 2004)? In this context it is worth quoting at some length Clark’s notation:

“A notable case of extremely high faculty independence is found in contemporary

Yugoslavia. There the faculties, not the Universities, as wholes, are very much the

main units of local organization. Their strength has been increased by the deliberate


decentralization of power in virtually all societal sectors, which has made Yugoslavia

so unlike other Communist countries. For what does workers’ ‘self-management’ mean

when applied to higher education? As Geoffrey Gilles has shown, it means that power

flows to societal clusters. Individual units can set themselves up and govern themselves

in whatever form they wish, with the higher level of government even constitutionally

barred, after 1974, from power of supervision (…) Thus we have the ironic situation in

which the extreme case of minimal interdependence of units within a university comes

not from age-old doctrines and practices of the medieval collegium carried into the

modern period, but from one of the latest and most noted socialist experiments. To the

specialization of work and commitment which has caused European faculties to have

quite low interdependence, there has now been added new doctrines and practices of

authority that encourage the disciplines to go their own way”

(Clark, 1983; 2004:8).

Macedonia has been struggling with this high degree of independence of faculties while making attempts to build a governance structure capable of developing and implementing policy reforms. As a signatory to the Bologna Declaration in 2003, the country became committed to the myriad of policy and structural dimensions, while at the same time having to deal with the highly fragmented governance system.

The 2002 World Bank Report on the education strategy for the twenty-first century suggested two alternative policies for the “highly fragmented and unevenly governed, managed, and monitored system of higher education in Macedonia: a decentralized or centralized and coordinated system”.

The first alternative deals with the issue of restructuring: “Instead of maintaining the practical monopoly of one big university and a smaller institution, it would be reasonable to restructure higher education into a more competitive system of six to eight institutions. This change could encourage more competitiveness, innovation, and flexibility, which are needed to modernize academic institutions” (World Bank, 2002:33).

The second alternative deals with the issue of centralization:

“In order to avoid fragmentation and lack of coordination, more centralized

policy-making could be implemented in existing universities to persuade all

faculties to undertake the following: pursue reforms, achieve internal and external

competitiveness, creatively use incentives for innovation and modernization, and

meet both traditional and new demands of the economy and society. More systematic

and centralized policy-making at the rector, Senate, and council level is necessary

if the institution is to redefine its mission and vision. In most cases, centralization

of policy-making within a big institution, composed of faculties with different and

often conflicting interests, is difficult to achieve. Consequently, the university’s central

leadership would gain the right and responsibility to define the institution’s strategy,



issue degrees and diplomas (based on external accreditation), receive and allocate

public funds, regulate the reception and use of non-public funds (tuition fees, contract

work, etc.), establish human resource and personnel management and personnel

contracts, and set up strategy and management of intellectual property rights for the

entire institution; faculties would remain in control of the curriculums, examination

systems, performance assessments, quality assurance and research”

(World Bank, 2002:34).

The focus of the debate concentrated on whether the Macedonian Government should retain control of the regulatory role with very limited funding, or take up a facilitative role. The other question concerned who would take the leading role in regard to the higher education reforms, the Ministry or the university. In effect, the new legislation places an emphasis on increasing the efficiency of governance and management and on creating de facto higher education institutions: the university as a real institution rather than as a loose federation of individual faculties. The Law on Higher Education (2008) stipulates the ‘functional integration’ at Rector’s level as a model offering a compromise solution for the university and the faculties. The ‘functional integration’ is a transitional phase meeting the Bologna requirements for an integrated university.

The evolving social and economic demands for knowledge and educated labour, and the new mechanisms for steering higher education, often involve a new regulatory environment and the introduction of instruments designed to create market-like competition within the sector (Amaral et al., 2002). These have brought about significant changes in higher education and research. The introduction of market mechanisms and competition is a novelty as a steering concept. The Macedonian Government started moving beyond public service rhetoric by introducing quasi-market arrangements in higher education by setting out its support for the establishment of private universities and espousing the economic potential of encouraging world-renowned universities to open branches in the country. What is the rationale for private providers of higher education and the meaning of privatization in higher education? There is a Western pattern with a long history and tradition, but a small share of enrolments, and a Central and South East European new pattern, defined by ‘after the 1989’ changes, with exploding enrolments in the private sector. According to Dima (2004), in Western Europe, privatization has meant diversification of funding sources and increased competition among institutions associated with the development of the so-called quasi-market structures for higher education. On the other hand, in Central and South East Europe, privatization means mainly the growth or the dramatic increase in numbers of private higher education institutions. The emergence of entrepreneurial behaviour in higher education traditions and management in the transitional countries of ‘New Europe’ also indicates: (a) entrepreneurialism or (b) lack of entrepreneurial sense in the public universities (Kuzmanoska, 2008).

The scarcity of finance and the situation of doing more with less have forced the government to initiate new methods of funding. More mixed funding arrangements involve greater institutional entrepreneurialism and a review of the demand and supply side of funding. This provides another insight into the domination paradigm of the privatization of higher education in terms of establishing private higher education institutions.


The Government is actively experimenting with an increasingly diverse range of policy instruments. However, comparatively little is known about which policy instruments work best in what situations, and what contextual and policy factors have an impact. Little, also, is known of the costs versus the benefits, and why Ministers and government officials decide on using some instruments in preference to others. The range of instruments used by government involves: regulation; advocacy, persuasion, information; consultation; financial incentives and disincentives.

2. The changing scene of higher education institutions and the national innovation system

The dissolving of discrete domains such as state, society, market, culture and science itself leads to the breaking down of boundaries and the differentiation between institutions such as universities, government, and industrial or business organizations (Henkel, 2002). The following factors are likely to provide the framework for developing science policy in the coming years: (a) fiscal pressure - supplementation of governmental with non-governmental revenues and; (b) pressure on universities from governments and the industry sector to develop applied research and make available in education forms of delivery which suit the needs of companies and public sector organizations (Gibbons, 1998; Kuzmanoska and Piperkoski, 2008).

Given the trend towards fiscal austerity and the need for revenue diversification, financial stringency seems to be both unavoidable and indispensable. Until recently, political thinking was not convinced of the social return of the public R&D expenditure, and consequently the Macedonian scientific world and other interested groups had to develop more practical approaches in relation to scientific research and technological advancement. Policy measures included:

(a)An increase in investment in R&D – different ministries were encouraged to adopt the goal of investing 1 per cent of the GDP in R&D till 2010 (Ministry of Education and Science, 2006; Government of Macedonia, 2007).

(b)Budgetary funds provided for R&D which would benefit the private sector.

(c)Encouragement and support for science through fiscal policy – the Ministry of Finance has to facilitate the process of implementation of a new taxation regime for SME that will foster the R&D investments (Ministry of Education and Science, 2006; Government of Macedonia, 2007).

A debate has developed as to what extent Macedonian higher education and science are expected to change their modes of knowledge production. This underlines the importance of ‘problem solving’ approaches linked to the greater dissemination of knowledge capacity throughout the economy and society, and has brought into the spotlight the blurred boundaries between fundamental research, applied research and development. The supposedly established boundaries between public and private research, between public institutions and industry and other knowledge producers in society are called into question. The specific conditions under which knowledge is generated within public-sector research and transferred to other sectors of society are also being questioned. The



convergence and crossing-over of three worlds which were once very much separate, has brought into play the “Triple Helix” model of interaction between industry, government and universities.

The model has the common objective of trying to realize an innovative environment “… consisting of university spin-off firms, trilateral initiatives for knowledge-based economic development, and strategic alliances among enterprises (large and small, operating in different areas, and with different levels of technology), government laboratories, and academic research groups. Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff (2000) argue over the intersection of Mode 1 (science and scientists) with Mode 2 (knowledge and practitioners) and Mode 2 with Mode 1 in the Triple Helix model. According to them, the system is neither integrated nor completely differentiated, but it performs on the edges of fractional differentiations and local integrations (ibid:119). However, at times when changes in the exogenous factors influencing the systems of innovation are bringing to the forefront the relationships and fluxes of information between actors, both models point to an increasing relevance of the interactions between sectors for the development of science and for innovation. The accompanying indicators support the evidence that academic research contributes more directly to economic growth, and that scientific research should be evaluated not only on the basis of scientific excellence but also societal utility” (Etzkowitz et al, 1998; Ziman, 2000). Among the ideas for developing a new governance model for research, the Triple Helix model stands alongside suggestions for a more elaborate concept, with a particular emphasis on the interplay between actors, organizations and institutions. The emerging question is whether the integration of political, industrial and academic interests brings about the development of a new institutional order and whether all three spheres of the Triple Helix “ … have merged within the new organizational field (‘knowledge-based economy’) guided by a norm system stressing the importance of techno-economic renewal and market-determined success” (Benner and Sandstrom, 2000: 292).

The ‘Triple Helix’ interaction process has been represented by three factors or levels: the actors, the institutions and the rules and regulations. The linkage warrants closer scrutiny (Viale and Ghiglione, 1998). The analysis in the study develops a more focused approach towards the characteristics of ‘actors’ - the micro-level, and the institutions - the ‘meso-level’ in terms of ‘academic entrepreneurship’. Where ever the ‘bottom up’ approach dominates the researchers as actors may raise questions about possible ways of coping with societal problems in different areas, and the effect of government measures. ‘Academic entrepreneurship’ includes the pursuit of entrepreneurial activities including contract research, technical consultancy, knowledge transfer, external training and activities devoted to ‘wealth creation’ through university spin off companies, patenting and licensing to existing firms. The application of the Triple Helix model at micro- and meso-level reveals the emergence of coercive, normative and mimetic processes under the umbrella of organizational routines, structures and norms. Coercive forces come to the surface when universities and/or faculties have to deal with resource allocation and public regulation. Normative aspects are related to eventual conflict between norms and values. It is important to set the benchmark for a successful university or individual faculty, to provide comparisons. The new environment is more complex and more risky than the old one, with multiple demands and opportunities that require new professional skills and empower those who have them. This puts additional pressure on the traditional selection methods for academic leadership and institutional management. The traditional system of


higher education governance and management will remain in place, at least temporarily but there is likely to be some movement away from amateur academic management towards a combination of academic innovation and managerial competence.

These liberal policies have led to a flurry of initiatives, such as science parks and Centres of Excellence (CE), identified as ‘hybrid agents of innovations’. Feasibility studies point towards the potential for starting up at least two science and business parks where the production of software and other IT related parts and equipment will take place. Given the geographical location of the country, the starting point for the Centres of Excellence (CE) will be in the promotion and support of innovations in the areas of molecular biology, software etc. However, as a result, institutions and activities at different levels of the research system may become aligned and a new regime emerge (Rip, 2002).

The evolution of the ‘Triple Helix’ entails establishing the connection between internal and external policy, and promotion of the ‘Triple Helix’ interaction, with the appropriate internal governance and mediation mechanisms that need to be created at institutional level (Kitagawa, 2005). The focused analysis of the evolution of the ‘Triple Helix’ model also affects the rules and regulations – at the ‘macro’ level it enables a balance to be achieved between the incentives for commercial and academic activities conducted by academics, and financial incentives already in place. In this respect, analysis of the new governmental policies gives a telling account of policy modification against which, as a backdrop, a number of policy issues were analyzed. A number of new laws and regulations have been developed and adopted: on scientific and research activities; on encouraging and supporting technology development; on industrial and intellectual property protection; on the award and distribution of funds for research projects; and encouragement of better promotion and use of EC programmes available for Macedonia. These aim to reduce bureaucracy by streamlining the regulations to cut red tape, decrease the legislative barriers and ease administrative procedures. The Government of Macedonia (2006) adopted a Programme for Research and Science 2006-2010, which sets out active measures for determining financial, legal and institutional aspects, develops the cooperation of higher education with industry, and establishes a pro-active approach to international cooperation and to increased participation of the country in the Framework and other EU programmes. A close examination of the specific regulations set in the Macedonian policy context emphasizes the organizational impact on the universities. The effective dissemination of knowledge between knowledge institutions, such as universities, and the private sector, thus becomes heavily dependent on certain regulatory factors: intellectual property rights (IPR) policy in the public sector; developing new sources of revenue; mediation of the flow of knowledge between industry and universities by formal licensing agreements; and industry-specific public goods (ISPG). It should be noted, however, that the expectations regarding university patenting and exclusivity in exploitation of research results may become complicated and controversial, especially regarding the principle of free dissemination of publicly funded research.



3. Future considerations The importance of higher education, science and research policy is now gaining ground in political circles. Science can no longer be mediated and regulated through a limited number of bureaucratic or professional institutions. Though some of these will persist, science is also engaged in collaboration, negotiation, debate and conflict involving a range of actors. Increasingly, policy-makers have sought to introduce non-academic, evaluative criteria, such as social relevance and assessments of social, economic and environmental impact upon science, whilst research users tend to be incorporated into the evaluative systems of funding bodies as well as, in some cases, into the research process itself. Other considerations include the commodification of scientific knowledge, the conversion of pioneering technology into intellectual property, and the diversification of external finance and competitive funding.

The capacity for profit-making combined with the importance of intellectual reputation puts at stake the role university leadership and management. The changing relationship of government to the higher education institutions generates new kinds of expectations which are placed on institutional governance, leadership and management. Those whose role in academic management is to stand between university and state, and between the academics and those they serve, have a difficult task in understanding the range of their clients and responding to their needs and demands.

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Henkel, M. 2002. Current Science Policies and their Implications for the Concept of Academic Identity. Paper presented at the International workshop on Science, Training and Career; Changing Modes of Knowledge Production and Labor Markets, CHEPS, University of Twente, Enschede, the Netherlands, 21 and 22 October.

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Kitagawa, F. 2005. Entrepreneurial Universities and the Development of Regional Societies, a Spatial View of the Europe of Knowledge. In: Higher Education Management, Special Issue Entrepreneurship, Vol. 17, No. 3, Paris: OECD. pp: 65-89.

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Schimank, U.; Kehm, B. and Enders, J. 1999. Institutional Mechanisms of Problem Processing of the German University System: Status Quo and New Developments. In: Braun, D. and Merrien, F.X. (eds.), Towards a New Model of Governance for Universities? A Comparative View, London and Philadephia: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.

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Contact details:

Irena Kuzmanoska Project Director/Education,Sagittarius Ltd,Ivo Lola Ribar 147-1/2,1000 Skopje, Republic of Macedonia.e-mail:[email protected]

Zoran Popovski Associate Professor,Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Food,University “Ss. Cyril And Methodius” – Skopje,Aleksandar Makedonski bb,1000 Skopje, Republic of Macedonia.e-mail: zpopovski@ zf.ukim.edu.mk

http://www.jrc.es/home/report/english/articles/vol29/REG1E296.htm


Chapter 11Impact of temporary labour migration on the demand for education: Implications for human resource development in the Philippines

Tereso S. Tullao and John Paolo R. Rivera, the Philippines


1. IntroductionMigration and overseas employment have been part of the lives of thousands of Filipino households. It is estimated that there are close to eight million Filipinos overseas either as permanent residents, temporary workers, or irregular migrants while 3,000 Filipinos are leaving daily. Many of these Filipinos are temporary workers known as Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs). However, there are also a large number of them who leave the country for tourism and other purposes but they eventually overstay, seek employment and become irregular workers.

For over three decades, overseas employment has become a part of the culture of Filipino families. The remittance income received by households has improved their standards of living and social status in the community. At the macro level, the remittance inflows of over US$12 billion in 2006 represented more than 20 per cent of the country’s exports receipts and had contributed in the stability of the peso and more recently to the appreciation of the currency.

One interesting social impact of temporary labour migration is the effects on the demand for education. Firstly, the phenomenon of temporary external migration in the country is pervasive. Second, the private sector is very prominent in the provision of educational services in the Philippines and thus very responsive to the changes in the factors that may affect demand for education. Third, enhanced expenditure on education at the household level may have positive effects on improving the human capital of household members. Fourth, the effect of temporary migration on education may have positive as well as negative implications for overall human resource development in the country.

Thus, it is interesting to inquire into the extent of the effects of temporary migration on the demand for education and evaluate its impact on the country’s human resource development.

2. Overseas employment of FilipinosFor this study, we make use of the data on the flows of OFWs that have been deployed over the years, sourced from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA, 2006). From this, we can trace the growth of deployed workers over time, and the direction and changes in major geographical destinations. We can also identify the various occupational, educational and other characteristics of OFWs. What is interesting to note, from the data, are


changes in the occupational and educational characteristics of OFWs. Are OFWs moving towards more skilled or less skilled workers? Are the workers getting more educated or less educated?

Since the 1970s, OFWs have made significant contributions to the maintenance, stability and growth of the Philippine economy as they continuously search for various markets around the globe. The total volume of documented OFWs with processed contracts has been continuously rising through the years (Philippine Overseas Employment Administration [POEA], 2006).

Data from POEA show that countries in the Middle East absorbed more than 58 per cent of OFWs deployed in 2006, accounting for the biggest share of OFWs destinations relative to other major world groupings. Of the total 788 thousand OFWs deployed in 2006, 463 thousand were deployed in the Middle East, 59 thousand in Europe and 22 thousand in the United States of America (USA), while a total of 223 thousand were sent to various parts of Asia.

Among the countries in the Middle East, OFWs are concentrated in Saudi Arabia with around 50 per cent of OFWs deployed in the region going to Saudi Arabia. The Middle East, specifically Saudi Arabia, together with United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, and Qatar, has always been the top destination of OFWs because the region has been embarking on massive development projects since the 1970s. As a consequence, there has been a continuous increase in the inflow of OFWs in these countries (Department of Labor and Employment [DOLE], 2006).

In most cases, Filipino workers are in demand abroad because of their proficiency in the English language, their training in Western standards of education, their reputation as being hardworking, resourceful, adaptable, and patient employees with a willingness to accept lower compensation, and as a value added for some employers, their adherence to Christian values (Macaraeg, 2005).

The Philippines is one of the largest suppliers of a variety of workers deployed overseas such as doctors, engineers, nurses, teachers, technicians, production workers, caregivers, entertainers, domestic workers, and many others. Limited domestic employment opportunities as well as a high compensation package attract many educated workers to seek overseas employment (Macaraeg 2005).

Over these years, the top three occupational groups invariably have been production workers, service workers and professional workers. In 2006, production workers accounted for 48 per cent of the total while service workers and professional workers constituted 35 per cent and 12 per cent respectively. In relation to this, data also show that OFWs are widely dispersed across the globe with concentrations in developed countries such as the Australia, Canada, Japan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Taiwan, and the USA

The household and related workers category constitutes the biggest major occupational group in 2006, accounting for almost 30 per cent of the total deployed land-based new hires. ‘Domestic helper’ is among the job categories, which was recorded as among the largest number of Filipino workers deployed overseas with a volume of 91,451. From the data, it can be seen that the country deploys workers from all types of occupational groups, mostly of the skilled-worker type.

Chapter 11 Impact of temporary labour migration on the demand for education:

implications for human resource development in the Philippines


Recently, the number of high school graduates taking up overseas employment has declined and there has been an increasing trend of college graduates being deployed abroad as OFWs. This is because the current international labour market demands significant educational achievement among its recruits, particularly a college degree. Even production jobs in the world-leading manufacturers demand workers with advanced education and skills.

Consequently, many Filipino degree holders are enticed to go abroad because they could reap better benefits there, resulting in a brain drain. Nonetheless, college undergraduates as well as those with lower educational attainments still manage to go and find jobs abroad as domestic helpers, factory workers, construction workers, entertainers and other work, which does not require any specific technical background.

Data show that the bulk of OFWs have business related courses. On the other hand, the figures for nursing and engineering are very similar. These figures are reasonable in that both have a fair share of demand across the globe. Nursing professionals are highly sought after in developed countries with ageing populations, such as Japan, as well as in those countries with insufficient labour supply to sustain their economic activities. Likewise, engineers are highly demanded in developing and developed countries embarking on massive developmental projects, specifically in construction and reclamation such as Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates (UAR). Finally, the exodus of teachers continues to grow, from an average of 73 teachers in previous years, to 221 teachers per year recently opting to teach in the USA according to POEA. Professionals and skilled workers choose to work in other countries because of the relatively higher pay they can get abroad compared to working in the Philippines.

The volume of migration of skilled professionals has been an increasing trend over the years and Philippine top government officials see nothing wrong with this (Manalansan, 2003). “The labor and health departments are even instituting mechanisms to enhance the country’s capability to send ‘globally-competitive’ professionals abroad” (Manalansan, 2003). Moreover, the Philippine Government expressed powerlessness over the overwhelming number of professionals leaving the country to work abroad. However, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) makes sure that local nursing graduates are on a par with international standards and this is done through the Technical Education Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

There has been an increasing trend of Filipino professional and skilled workers, particularly nurses, migrating to developed countries due to high rates of pay. Consequently, there is a proliferation of nursing ‘diploma mills’ or schools offering poor quality nursing education (Ronda, 2008) resulting in an unsatisfactory pass rate in the licensing examination for nurses, thus ruining the reputation of the Philippines as the leading producer of high-quality nurses in the global labour market


3. Overseas employment and the demand for educationMany factors influence the demand for education, since it is considered as an investment in human capital (HC). In the past, factors such as rate-of-return, economic progress, employability and availability of credit have been taken into consideration. Other factors also include long distances between homes and schools, entrance exam results, educational attainment of parents, and ability to meet grade requirements.

Studies have also established that family characteristics (Borromeo, Castillo and Lopez, 2007), and structures (Biblarz and Raftery, 1999) have an influence on a family’s demand for education. Moreover, Binder and Woodruff (1999) and Lillard and Willis (1994) established a positive relationship between the educational attainment of parents and that of their children. Blake (1981), on the other hand, established that students who have more siblings achieve lower levels of education, as resources are diverted towards the other needs of the family like food, clothing and shelter. In addition to this, Plug and Vijverberg (2001) and Hauser and Daymont (1977) also established that those with higher income levels helped further the demand for higher educational attainment.

The usual analysis for the demand for education is centered on internal factors. However, globalization’s effects and enhanced trade in services need to be taken into consideration, especially with regard to the movement of persons and how this affects the demand for education. Two major drivers that enhance the movement of people across boundaries to render temporary service are (1) the process of globalization and (2) the economic and demographic asymmetries across countries (Tullao and Cortez, 2006a).

However, the movement of persons represents a brain drain which can be considered as a loss of skilled talent and labour from one’s country. A person’s drive to increase his/her human capital may lead them to seek employment abroad, since pay is higher overseas (Tullao and Cortez, 2006b). This leaves the domestic human resource pool with less skilled or qualified human resources, thus contributing to labour inefficiencies and higher labour costs. Aside from this, the brain drain also increases the demand for education (Tullao, 1982).

The effect of external remittances on educational expenditure was studied using an OLS model. Using the Family Income and Expenditures Survey (FIES) from the National Statistics Office (NSO), we developed a behavioral equation that employs the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression technique. This exponential regression model can is represented by the equation

Where EDUC is the educational expenditure of a household; DHI is the domestic, internally generated household income; REMIT is the remittance income that a household receives from abroad; HSIZE is the household size; SCHL represents the number of household members between ages 7 to 24 that demand education; EDUHH is the highest educational attainment of the household head; and AGEHH is the age of the household head.

It was found that domestic income and remittances from abroad increased educational expenditure, since (1) education is a consumer durable good whose consumption increases as income increases and (2) education can also be considered as an investment good, since this enhances the productivity of household members in the long run. Household

lnEDUCi = + 2lnDHIi + 3lnREMITi + 4lnHSIZEi + 5lnSCHLi + 6lnEDUHHi + 7lnAGEHHi + ui




size on the other hand, reduces educational expenditure since the family tends to spend their limited resources on other necessities like food, shelter and clothing. The number of members of the household that demand schooling obviously increases educational expenditure. Moreover, the educational attainment and age of the household head also has a positive influence on the demand for education of the household, thus increasing educational expenditure.

As shown, the results follow the a-priori expectations of our model, and all of the coefficients of elasticity are significant at the 95 per cent confidence level. The results are also consistent with the findings of Hauser and Daymont (1977) and Plug and Vijverberg (2001). The negative coefficient of HSIZE, representing the effect of household size on educational expenditure is also consistent with the findings and a-priori expectations of Blake (1981) and Eijick and de Graaf (1995).

Ordinary least squares regression

Next, we examined the relationship between educational expenditure and external remittances by region. It can be noted that the regions with the highest coefficients of elasticity for educational expenditure are the National Capital Region (NCR) with 1.44 and Western Visayas with 1.28, where the most populous urban areas of the country are located, namely Metro Manila and Metro Cebu respectively. External remittances also displayed the same positive effect on educational expenditure across all regions, the highest from Southern Mindanao with 0.042 and Central Luzon with 0.040 coefficients. Household size also exhibits the same negative elasticity across regions; which is again consistent with Blake (1981) and Eijick and de Graaf (1995). The number of children demanding schooling and the educational attainment and age of the household head also exhibit the same positive elasticities across all regions, which makes our claim about this positive relationship more robust.

Regional coefficients of elasticity of educational expenditures


We then applied the same OLS technique per income decile. Implementing this also gave us a consistent direction of relationships across all income deciles. It can however be noted that even if some coefficients are higher at certain income levels, their relationships with the respective variables remain inelastic.

Coefficients of elasticity of educational elasticity by income decile

In tracing the impact of overseas employment on the demand for higher education, a general demand function for higher education is shown below.

DHEt = f(PCRGDPt, ARREMITPt, CPISERVt, EMt)

The general demand equation for higher education for all year programmes at year t (DHEt) is a function of per capital real GDP of the Philippines at time t (PCRGDPt), average real remittances at time t (ARREMITPt), the consumer price index for services at time t (CPISERVt) and the volume of employed workers who possess a college degree at time t (EMt).

The demand for higher education is proxied by college enrolment. This is a good approximate since there are no supply constraints with respect to higher education in the Philippines. Real GDP per capita and remittances from abroad (in Philippine pesos), proxies for income are expected to have a positive relationship with educational demand, since education is deemed to be a normal good. Following the law of demand, the consumer price index for services estimates the price for education, and this would indicate an inverse relationship with the demand for education. Lastly, employment captures how great the employment opportunities are, and thus a positive relationship between educational demand and educational employment is predicted. Using 1992 to 2005 data from the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) and the National Statistics Office (NSO), we utilized panel data econometric techniques in analyzing the relationships between these variables.

In order to resolve the problem of observation insufficiency, a panel data econometrics will be implemented wherein the following degree programmes will be considered namely (1) Accountancy; (2) Business Related; (3) Education Science and Teacher Training; (4) Engineering and Technology, and (5) Nursing. Any other degrees considered will be included as (6) Other Degrees. The utilization of panel data will be advantageous because the unobserved heterogeneity and aggregate bias of each degree programme will be accounted for (Gujarati, 2003). Note that Dit is a dummy variable equal to one if it is an element i for all t = 1992, 1993, …, 2005 and Dit = 0 if otherwise. Note that in order to avoid




the dummy variable trap, Accountancy is chosen as a base degree. The model specification is shown below.

It can be seen from the results that the income variable as measured by per capita real gross domestic product has a positive and significant effect on enrolment. Holding all other factors constant, for every percentage increase in the PCRGDP, there will be 3.5 percent increase in the demand for higher education across all degrees taken into consideration. Average remittances also have a positive and significant effect on enrolment. However, it is inelastic with respect to enrolment. These results are consistent with the previous OLS regressions as well as with the study of Hauser and Daymont (1977) and Plug and Vijverberg (2001). Price has a significant and negative effect on educational demand which is consistent with the Law of Demand. However, employment does not follow our a-priori expectations and exhibits a counter-intuitive negative relationship with demand instead. A rational individual will choose and demand a degree programme which enables him to recover the cost of education in the future through the job opportunities waiting after finishing his degree. Notice also that there are varying intercepts for each degree, except that of the Nursing dummy. This means that Nursing has the same regression function as that of Accountancy.

LSDV fixed effects linear panel regression results

Further diagnostic testing revealed that severe serial correlation exists in the model used. Therefore, we followed Gujarati (2003) and did separate regressions for the model excluding employment and the model including employment alone.

The estimated coefficients of PCRGDP, ARREMITP, and CPISERV are consistent with the initial panel regression. Moreover, the nursing dummy is now significant at the 10 per cent which implies that nursing has a different regression function from accountancy. This is more acceptable because it is deemed that all degrees have their respective inherent characteristics such as programme cost and programme duration, which greatly affects


the demand for higher education. Furthermore, the regression of the employment variable now follows economic rationality because it reveals that employment is now positively and significantly related with demand for education. With regard to the intercepts, it is also evident that among the courses, business-related courses have the highest demand.

LSDV fixed effects linear panel regression results

4. Implications for the impact of overseas employment on education

The impact of overseas employment on the demand for education has implications for the human resource development of the country in terms of the readiness of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) as well as the readiness of graduates of these educational institutions.

A number of studies have been commissioned to assess higher education in the Philippines. These studies have focused on issues regarding efficiency, quality and effectiveness, and equity in access in higher education institutions. Bernardo (2003) summarized the efficiency issues as: (1) The lack of a rational system for establishing HEIs; (2) Poor efficiencies of size; (3) poor student flows; (4) The lack of articulation between performance and budgets, and (5) the low external efficiency of the HE system (Salazar-Clemeña and Tullao, 2005).




Weaknesses have been identified in terms of inadequate faculty credentials, impractical and outdated curricular offerings, a weak accreditation system, poor graduates’ performance in licensing examinations and inadequate financing. Given these weaknesses of HEIs in the Philippines, the ability of the country to continue supplying manpower in various parts of the world is at risk. Unless these major problems are addressed, the Philippines may not be able to supply the world with the qualified manpower coming from HEIs with inadequate human and physical resources to produce graduates that are competitive in the global market that is increasingly leaning towards knowledge-based industries.

Given the popularity and acceptance of our professionals and graduates in the global labour market as shown in the increasing trend of outflows of skilled and professional workers, we can possibly liberalize trade in the country’s educational services. Harnessing the potential of the Philippines as a regional base for education has two requirements: (1) The willingness of suppliers to be more liberal and open to other modes of supply and (2) Meeting the requirements of providing educational services through such modes of supply. By modes of supply, we can refer to the GATS 4 modes of supply: (1) Cross-border transactions where online academic activities like exams and lectures can take place; (2) Consumption abroad, where foreigners opt to study in the Philippines instead of in their home countries (an example would be foreigners choosing to study English here); (3) Commercial presence where actual establishments of branches of local educational institutions are made abroad; and (4) Movement of natural persons where people like professors travel abroad and undertake visiting professorships, research abroad and the like.

With ever increasing cross-border education brought about by legal rules and agreements that bind contracting parties, urgent attention must be given to the question of quality assurance (AQ) and accreditation of educational service providers. In order to establish uniformity and maintain quality in higher education provision, there will be a need to set accreditation criteria and quality assurance mechanisms that are mutually acceptable to other countries

As shown from the coefficients of our regression equations, households with OFWs tend to spend more on education than families who do not receive external remittances at the same level of income. This means from the perspective of the culture of migration that families tend to invest in education as a way of preparing their family members to migrate subsequently. There is now a shift in the reason for choosing degree programmes – from domestic employment to employment overseas.

This alteration of academic thrusts has serious implications. First, financing public higher education institutions would seem to be a waste of resources, since human capital produced would eventually ‘flow’ out of the country. As more funds are reallocated towards public higher education, funds for basic education may be substantially reduced. And given an increasing school-age population, the quality and access to basic education is imperiled with such reallocation.

Because of globalization and liberalization, highly trained individuals from developing countries may easily move to sectors where there are manpower deficiencies in developed countries, while the inexperienced and unskilled ones are left behind in the sending countries. Because of the huge demand for nursing globally, many of qualified and well-trained nurses from developing countries have migrated to developed countries. Aside

1�0 • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

from increasing the training costs of inexperienced nurses, this massive outflow of nurses can threaten the viability and productivity of the health care sector.

There are social costs in the exodus of graduates of HEIs to seek employment overseas – and these costs have to be quantified. These are enormous considering that public funds were used to educate the brightest students and their exit may entail a drain on the country’s human resources.

One of the main drawbacks of external migration is the phenomenon of brain drain. The increase in the human capital value of professionals produced by this training and educational expenditure may push many of them to work overseas, which may lead to the problem of brain drain (Tullao and Cortez, 2006).

As more employment opportunities abroad open up, many local academics will opt to migrate. The ‘brain drain’ will certainly be harmful to the economy as other countries will reap the benefits of the education and training provided by the Philippine education system. Training their replacements will entail additional expenses, with no assurance that these replacements will remain in the country.

5. ConclusionThe overall objective of this study is to explore the extent to which temporary labour migration affects the demand for education. As a consequence of this relationship, there is a need to evaluate its impact on the human resource development of the country.

In this study, we have seen the increasing extent and magnitude of temporary labour migration in the Philippines, specifically the migration of professional and highly-skilled workers. We have also empirically verified that those receiving external remittances tend to spend more on education than those who do not. Moreover, we find that education is a normal good – the higher the income of a household, the higher its expenditure on education. Regional and income-wise regressions also follow the coefficients in the national setting, except for that of the lowest income decile, where resources tend to be spent on other basic necessities instead of education.

In estimating the demand for higher education, we also verify that real per capita GDP, prices for services, remittances and even degree programmes affect educational demand. Also, the strong relationship between overseas employment and the demand for education has major implications for the human resource development of the country, the: (i) globalization of trade in educational services; (ii) redirection of the thrust in higher education; (iii) threat to sectors with heavy migration of manpower, and (iv) long-term loss to the economy.

Faced with these predicaments, what do we do? First, we need to improve the management of temporary labour migration. Second, there is a need to address the negative consequences of labour migration, such as brain drain. Third, remittances ought to be redirected towards income and employment-generating activities instead of just consumption in order to address the negative effects of temporary labour migration. Lastly, since the Government cannot control the volume of labour migration, it should focus on investing more on education, health and other human capital-enhancing expenditure to increase the competitiveness of our workers in the global labour market.



The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge • 1�1

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1�2 • Occasional paper no.16 • Selected Papers from the Global Research Seminar on Sharing Research Agendas on Knowledge Systems

Regional Seminar on the Implications of the WTO/ GATS on Higher Education in Asia and the Pacific. Seoul, Republic of Korea, 27 to 29 April 2005.

Tullao, T. 1982. Implications of the Brain Drain. DLSU Dialogue. 16, 1 October 1982.

Tullao, T. and Cortez, M. 2006a. Enhancing the Movement of Natural Persons in the ASEAN Region: Prospects and Constraints. Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade. Monograph.

______. 2006b. Issues and Prospects on the Movement of Natural Persons and Human Capital Development in the Philippine-American Economic Relations. Philippine Institute for Development Studies. Discussion Paper Series 2006-07.

Contact details:

Tereso S. Tullao, Professor of Economics,Center for Business and Economics Research and Development,De La Salle University – Manila,2401 Taft Avenue, 1004 Manila, the Philippines.e-mail: [email protected]

John Paolo R. Rivera,Professor of Economics,Center for Business and Economics Research and Development,De La Salle University – Manila, 2401 Taft Avenue, 1004 Manila, the Philippines.e-mail: [email protected]



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