The researcher in Italy: A profession in search of recognition

Abstract

This article deals with the “teething, problems” of the profession of researchers in Italy. This group of professionals in fact has grown very rapidly over the last two decades, but they still seem to be striving to find their proper place in the organization they work in and recognition from society in general. At the same time they have acquired a sufficiently self-awareness as an emerging group and started claiming their own “rights”. The article examines some problems researchers encounter in their specific working setting (industry, university, public research agencies), such as mobility, status, and career prospects. Mobility within the Italian science and technology (S&T) system is very low and is essentially one way, from industry. the professions, and public research agencies, to university, This peculiarity is very closely linked to the high prestige enjoyed by university professors in this country. Moreover. recent laws concerning university teaching staff have de facto saturated the permanent staff, severely restricting both mobility to university and the intake of new blood. An indication of the self-awareness of the profession may he found in the mobilisation of researchers in public research agencies and their claim to their “ecological niche”. It is concluded that researchers, who may he considered a substantially homogeneous group, feel mature and numerous enough to demand the slalus and prestige adequate to their contribution to a modern society; it is also asserted that the delay in granting recognition is due to the organizations and institutions.