Socialists Reverse Budget Decline

Abstract

FRANCE PARIS— When France's new Socialist government unveiled its proposed 1998 budget last week, French scientists were eager to see whether education and research minister Claude Allegre had kept his pledge to give “new hope” to the nation's ailing research effort ( Science , 13 June, [p. 1638][1]). The verdict seems to be a guarded “yes.” Although overall the civilian research and development budget, at $8.8 billion, will remain flat when inflation is taken into account, a reorganization of priorities will give a small but welcome boost to basic research. And young scientists should benefit from a major new recruitment program for universities and public research agencies. “This is a better budget than we've had in the last few years,” says molecular biologist Edward Brody, director of the Center for Molecular Genetics in Gif-sur-Yvette. “It's going to give us a big psychological boost.” And developmental biologist Anne-Marie Duprat of Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse calls the budget a “beginning” that “will give some fresh air” to French science. Researchers have especially welcomed the creation of new research jobs. The budget would add 400 posts to public agencies such as the basic research organization CNRS and INSERM, its biomedical counterpart, as well as hundreds of positions in the universities. But some scientists expressed disappointment that support for basic lab costs in the public agencies will increase by only 2.5%, not counting a projected inflation rate of 1.4%. “It's good news for creating new positions, but not good news for the lab budgets,” says Pierre Chambon, director of the Institute of Genetics and Molecular and Cellular Biology near Strasbourg. University labs, on the other hand, will do significantly better, with a 5.4% increase. Geophysicist Vincent Courtillot, Allegre's chief adviser, insists that the new budget should not be judged purely in financial terms. “Allegre's view is that money is not the main thing,” Courtillot told Science . “In both the education and research budgets, the number one priority is creating new jobs.” Indeed, given France's sluggish economy and the budget slashing required by the European Union for entry into a single European currency, few researchers expected that Allegre would be able to greatly increase the overall science budget. “I think he's doing as well as he can,” says Chambon. Chambon and others argue, however, that if the research budget cannot be expanded further, French science must ultimately undergo dramatic reforms. “If you hire young people but don't increase the lab budget, they can't do research,” Chambon says. One solution, he suggests, would be to turn organizations like the CNRS and INSERM into U.S.-style granting agencies and have researchers compete with each other for funds. That would mean a sharp break with France's researcher-for-life tradition. “We need a reform that adjusts the number of active scientists to the realities of the budget,” Chambon concludes. But while such sweeping reforms do not appear to be on Allegre's immediate agenda, most French researchers are taking heart at the modest gains they have made in the new budget. “It's not a major transfusion,” says Brody. “But at least it will stop the hemorrhaging.” [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.276.5319.1638