Is University Research on the Decline?

Abstract

Science and technology are situated at the focal point of a certain number of funciions essential to the economy of the industrialised countries. Any research project, however specific and circumscribed, has implications extending beyond its immediate aims. The ultimate direction taken by any new knowledge or techniques which it uncovers, no less than its spin-off in other fields, can never be determined with certainty by those who are its prime movers. Yet it is long-term research which fashions the richest and most discursive links with society, doing so to the extent that it sets itself broader horizons, focuses on the advanced frontiers of scientific scrutiny, or grafts itself into different institutional settings, as in the case of government, industrial, or university laboratories. Long-term scientific and technological research fulfil a number of essential functions: these include preservation and strengthening of the scientific and technical infrastructure; continued capacity to stimulate progress in the possibilities opened up by new fields and to encourage fresh ideas and combinations of ideas; the moulding of new generations of scientists and engineers; the implementation of basic research intended as the source of future innovation; and the accumulation, organisation, and communication of learning. The concept of long-term research covers different research categories, ranging from basic research to the most ambitious applied research projects. This range is one in which the distinctions are by no means clearcut but in which, after all, any arbitrariness of definition is less important than the quality of the work, its capacity to extend the frontiers of learning, and its interest in terms of its possible areas of application. Moreover, the institutional location of such research affects its orientation and corresponds largely to a functional breakdown. For example, governmental laboratories are associated with research geared to strategic or social requirements which cannot be handled by oder sectors: industrial laboratories concentrate on long-term research likely to result in commercial applications while also guaranteeing the technical competence of the firm in question: and university laboratories carry out work less subject to tight (leadlines and more in accordance with the needs and conditions imposed by higher education. However, all these activities can only achieve their full potential to the extent that they are harnessed to a fully integrated research system in which the university institution plays an essential part. Conditioned by che scientists and engineers supplied by higher education, the vitality of industrial research also depends on its power to create links with research performed in this sector. Long-term research initiated in public establishments is very often destined for conversion into basic research and eventual obsolescence if it is not exposed to external influences. This explains the crucial importance of long-term research and, more particularly, university research. Its significance is not merely the result of its being research: its specific nature derives from the fact that it fulfils all the functions of long-term research,