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.
The Academic Research Enterprise
within the industrialized Nations:
Comparative Perspectives
Report of a Symposium
.
The Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable
National Academy of Sciences
National Academy of Engineering
Institute of Medicine
2101 Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington DC 20418
National Academy Press
Washington, D.C. March 1990
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THE GOVERNMENT-UNIVERSITY-INDUSTRY RESEARCH ROUNDTABLE
The Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable is sponsored by
the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and
Institute of Medicine. The Research Roundtable was created in 1984 to provide
a forum where scientists, engineers, administrators, and policy-makers from
government, university, and industry can meet on an ongoing basis to explore
ways to improve the productivity of the nation's research enterprise. The object
is to try to understand issues, to inject imaginative thought into the system, and
to provide a setting for discussion and the seeking of common ground. The
Roundtable does not make recommendations, nor offer specific advice. It does
develop options and bring all interested parties together. The uniqueness of the
Roundtable is in the breadth of its membership and in the continuity with
which it can address issues.
THE NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the
U.S. federal government established in 1950 to promote and advance scientific
progress in the United States, primarily by sponsoring scientific and engineering
research and by supporting selected activities in science and engineering
education. NSF considers proposals for support in any field of science,
including but not necessarily limited to, astronomy, atmospheric sciences,
biological and behavioral sciences, chemistry, computer sciences, earth sciences,
engineering, information science, materials research, mathematical sciences,
oceanography, physics, and social sciences. In deciding which proposals to
support, NSF relies heavily on the advice and help of advisory committees,
outside reviewers, and other experts to ensure that NSF reaches fair and
knowledgeable judgments. These scientists, engineers, and educators come from
colleges and universities, nonprofit research and educational organizations,
industry, and other governmental agencies.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 90-60989
International Standard Book Number 0-309-04249-6
S141
Printed in the United States of America
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FOREWORD
National policies and programs for scientific and technological research are increasingly
formulated within an international context. With the growing economic and scientific strength
of European and Pacific Rim nations, research competition is intensifying. Research decisions
made within any one nation rapidly influence research agendas worldwide. As a consequence,
scientists, engineers, administrators, and policy-makers in government, universities, and
industry require better understanding of the research systems of other nations.
Many challenges now confront the research community worldwide. While the research
agenda for scientists and engineers is expanding and ever more exciting, changes are occurring
within the larger social, political, and economic environment in which research is conducted.
Advances in fundamental knowledge are becoming more relevant to national economic
competitiveness. Urgent global problems, such as ozone depletion and acid rain, require
international collaboration in many scientific and technological fields. New communication
technologies both intensify competition and allow for greater research cooperation. At the
same time, however, expensive new scientific instrumentation escalates the costs of research
and in several countries there is a narrowing pipeline of new scientists and engineers.
Each nation is responding to these challenges with a distinct system for organizing research
activity, resulting from different histories, cultures, and traditions. With respect to the
conduct of basic research, for example, the industrialized nations differ widely in the
respective research roles of universities, governmental research institutes, and industrial
laboratories. Furthermore, each nation has produced a unique political arrangement for the
allocation of economic resources in support of research.
As the United States develops science and technology policies appropriate for the world
of the 21st century, we need to understand better the historical factors which produced these
diverse research systems and the social, political and economic changes now reshaping all
national research capacities. We hope that the information presented within this symposium
report contributes to that learning process.
In, ~
James D. Ebert
Chairman, Government
University-Industry
Research Roundtable
=f
Erich Bloch
Director, National Science Foundation
and
Chairman, Roundtable Working Group on the
Academic Research Enterprise
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Research Roundtable and the National Science Foundation wish to thank Mark B.
Adams, James R. Bartholomew, Alan D. Beyerchen, Robert Fox, Roger L. Geiger, and Sheldon
Rothblatt for their informative and candid symposium presentations. In their richly-
described portrayals of decision-making throughout the past century, these six historians of
science and higher education provide a necessary historical context for analyzing current
trends in the research systems of the United States, Japan, the Soviet Union, Great Britain,
Germany, and France.
Special thanks go to Nathan Reingold and Mary lo Nye for chairing the symposium
sessions and to T. Alexander Pond, a member of the Roundtable Working Group on the
Academic Research Enterprise, for his salient commentary as a panel discussant.
Thanks also go to the staff members who organized the symposium and prepared this
report, especially John P. Campbell, project director for the Roundtable Working Group on the
Academic Research Enterprise, and Ronald J. Overmann, director of the NSF Program on the
History and Philosophy of Science.
As conveyed in this report, the symposium discussions generated useful, sometimes
controversial, insights into the worldwide prospects for university-based research in the
sciences and technology. The symposium participants-speakers and guests made an
important contribution to the policy debate in the United States on the future of the U.S.
academic research enterprise.
STAFF
RESEARCH ROUNDTABLE
DON I. PHILLIPS, Executive Director,
Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable
JOHN P. CAMPBELL, Senior Program Officer,
Roundtable Working Group on the Academic Research Enterprise
SUSAN LEVIN, Editorial Consultant
SUSAN TAWFIK, Administrative Secretary
NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
RONALD J. OVERMANN, Program Director,
History & Philosophy of Science
.
1V
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PREFACE
The Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable was organized in l9g4 under
the aegis of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and
the Institute of Medicine. It is governed by a Council of 2S distinguished scientists, engineers,
administrators, and policy-makers from government, universities, and industry. Its purpose is
to create a national forum to air the issues that affect the nation's research enterprise, inject
imaginative thought into understanding the issues, and explore strategies and options for
improving the future of U.S. scientific research.
In 1987, the Roundtable Council inaugurated a comprehensive review of the U.S. academic
research enterprise. The Council assignee' this review to a Working Group of government
officials, corporate executives, university administrators, and scientists. The charge to the
Working Group was to examine current trends in the U.S. academic research enterprise, predict
the impact of the trends on the future of the enterprise, and explore options for the future.
To gain an international perspective on the issues addressed by the Working Group, the
Research Roundtable and the National Science Foundation co-sponsored a symposium entitled
"The University Research Enterprise within the Industrialized Nations: Comparative
Perspectives," held on March 23, 1989 at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington,
D.C. The purposes of the symposium were to:
Compare the histories of the larger national research systems the United States, Japan,
the Soviet Union, Great Britain, Germany, and France with special emphasis on
university research;
Examine the current pressures placed on the research system of each nation; and
Explore how each nation is responding to these pressures.
The symposium was organized into two panel sessions devoted to reviewing the histories
of six national research systems. A morning session focused on the research systems of the
relative "newcomers" to science and technology, the United States, Japan, and the Soviet
Union. An afternoon session focused on the research systems of the relatively older research
systems of Great Britain, Germany, and France. Panel speakers included historians of science
and higher education. The panel presentations were followed by comments from discussants
and other symposium guests.
Participants included senior staff within federal agencies and congressional committees,
representatives from professional societies and universities, scientific advisors from national
embassies, and staff from the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of
Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council. An agenda for the
symposium, as well as the names and affiliations of symposium participants, is found in the
Appendix.
For a discussion of the Phase One project of the Working Group on the Academic Research Enterprise, see
Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable, Science and Technology in the Academic Enterprise: Status,
Trends, and Issues' Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1989.
v
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This report is organized in two parts. Part One summarizes the symposium discussion
regarding current challenges confronting the research systems of all nationse Part Two
contains the individually-authored texts of the symposium presentations historical
perspectives on the evolution of research and higher education systems within the United
States, Japan, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, Germany, and France. The text of the
symposium presentation on Germany was revised in January 1990 to address challenges
confronting the German research system in response to political events in Eastern Europe
during 1989 and the recent momentum toward reunification of East and West Germany.
V1
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART ONE: CURRENT CHALLENGES
INTRODUCTION
GLOBAL TRENDS
NATIONAL RESPONSES
F]JI-URE STRATEGIES
PART TWO: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES
UNITED STATES
Me American University and Research-Roger L. Geiger
Bibliography
JAPAN
The University, Industry, and Research in Japan-James R Bartholomew
Bibliography .........................
SOVIET UNION
Research and the Russian Universin,,-Mark B. Adams .
Bibliography .............................
GREAT BRITAIN
Research and British Universities-Sheldon Rothblatt
Bibliography ....
FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
5
9
15
34
.................... 39
48
51
64
69
76
Trends in the Twentieth-Century German Research EnterDrise-Alan D. Beverchen 79
91
Bibliography .............
FRANCE
Research, Education, and the Industrial Economy in Modern France-Roben Fox
Bibliography
APPENDIX
SYMPOSIUM AGENDA .....
SYMPOSIUM PANELISTS ....
SYMPOSIUM PARTICIPANTS .
95
................. 107
· e
V11
111
112
113
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