Nierówności w produkcji wiedzy naukowej – rola najbardziej produktywnych naukowców w 11 krajach europejskich

In this paper, we focus on a rare scholarly theme of highly productive academics, statistically confirming their pivotal role in knowledge production across all 11 systems studies. The upper 10 percent of highly productive academics in 11 European countries studied (N = 17,211), provide on average almost half of all academic knowledge production. In contrast to dominating bibliometric studies of research productivity, we focus on academic attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions as predictors of becoming research top performers across European systems. Our paper provides a (large-scale and cross-country) corroboration of the systematic inequality in knowledge production, for the first time argued for by Alfred Lotka (1926) and Derek de Solla Price (1963). We corroborate of the deep academic inequality in science and explore this segment of the academic profession. The European research elite is a highly homogeneous group of academics whose high research performance is driven by structurally similar factors, mostly individual rather than institutional. Highly productive academics are similar from a cross-national perspective and they substantially differ intra-nationally from their lower-performing colleagues.W niniejszym tekście skupiamy się na nierównościach w produkcji wiedzy naukowej i pokazujemy, że rozkład indywidualnych wzorców produktywności badawczej w systemach europejskich jest uderzająco podobny mimo odmiennych krajowych tradycji akademickich. Naukowcy znajdujący się na szczycie skali produktywności (górne 10% badaczy, którzy zajmują najwyższe miejsca pod względem produktywności publikacyjnej w 11 krajach europejskich) dostarczają średnio niemal połowę całej produkcji naukowej w swoich krajach. Nie inaczej jest w Polsce. Wychodząc od podobieństwa wzorców rozkładu produktywności w systemach europejskich, stawiamy ogólne pytania badawcze: kim są najbardziej produktywni naukowcy oraz jakiego rodzaju instytucjonalne i indywidualne czynniki zwiększają szanse na znalezienie się w ich gronie? Najbardziej produktywni badacze jako osobny sektor profesji akademickiej niezwykle rzadko dotąd stawali się przedmiotem badań naukowych. Ze względu na to, że 1/10 europejskich naukowców produkuje niemal połowę wszystkich wytworów badawczych (a 1/20 wytwarza niemal 1/3), ta grupa zasługuje na większą uwagę. Za cel stawiam sobie zbadanie wąsko rozumianej „europejskiej elity badawczej” z międzynarodowej perspektywy porównawczej. Podczas gdy większość wcześniejszych badań opiera się na modelach wykorzystujących regresję liniową, stosowanych do badania produktywności badawczej, w tym tekście wykorzystujemy model regresji logistycznej, poszukując właściwych dla danych krajów predyktorów stawania się produktywnym badaczem. Podstawowe dane analizowane w tym tekście pochodzą z dwóch dużych globalnych i europejskich projektów badawczych dotyczących profesji akademickiej (Changing Academic Profession – CAP oraz Academic Profession in Europe – EUROAC), obejmujących próbę liczącą 17 211 obserwacji. Dane odnoszą się do zachowań i postaw naukowców oraz produktywności badawczej subpopulacji najbardziej produktywnych naukowców (górne 10%, n = 1583), w odróżnieniu do subpopulacji pozostałych 90% naukowców (n = 12 325); w obu przypadkach zbiorowością są wyłącznie naukowcy, którzy zadeklarowali zaangażowanie w prowadzenie badań naukowych

The Globalization of Science: The Increasing Power of Individual Scientists

National science systems have become embedded in global science and countries do everything they can to harness global knowledge to national economic needs. However, accessing and using the riches of global knowledge can occur only through scientists. Consequently, the research power of nations relies on the research power of individual scientists. Their capacity to collaborate internationally and to tap into the global networked science is key. The constantly evolving, bottom-up, autonomous, self-regulating, and self-focused nature of global science requires deeper understanding; and the best way to understand its dynamics is to understand what drives academic scientists in their work. We are particularly interested in the contrast between global science as a largely privately governed and normatively self-regulating institution and global science as a contributor to global collective public goods. The idea that science remains a state-driven rather than curiosity-driven is difficult to sustain. In empirical terms, we describe the globalization of science using selected publication, collaboration, and citation data from 2000-2020. The globalization of science implies two different processes in two different system types: the growth of science in the Western world is almost entirely attributable to internationally co-authored publications; its growth in the developing world, in contrast, is driven by both internationally co-authored and domestic publications. Global network science opens incredible opportunities to new arrivals—countries as well as institutions and research teams. The global system is embedded in the rules created by scientists themselves and maintained as a self-organizing system and nation-states have another major level to consider in their science policies: the global level. Globalization of science provides more agency, autonomy, collegiality, and self-regulation to scientists embedded in national science structures and involved in global networks

Uniwersytet jako „wspólnota badaczy”? Polska z europejskiej perspektywy porównawczej i ilościowej

The author of the text is analysing the organizational patterns of the Polish higher education using international empirical data gathered in 11 countries of Europe (N = 17 212, projects of academic EUROAC and CAP academical staff research). His main research question reads as follows: in what extent does the theoretical model of the joint authority fit into the reality of Polish universities, examined on above 3700 Polish representatives of the academic staff? The reply is contextual and relative: we are presenting Polish universities in the context of universities functioning in 10 countries of Europe (Austria, Switzerland, Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, Finland, Italy, Norway, Portugal and Great Britain). The emerging from the examinations conflict between the vision of a university seen by academic community (i.e. an institutional model of the “community of researchers”, based on academic traditional values) and his vision shared by the community of reformers and political decision-makers (i.e. the instrumental model) has a fundamental meaning for the fate of the reforms of higher education in Poland.Tekst analizuje wzorce organizacyjne polskiego szkolnictwa wyższego wykorzystując międzynarodowe dane empiryczne zebrane w 11 krajach Europy (N = 17 212, projekty badania kadry akademickiej EUROAC i CAP). Jego główne pytanie badawcze brzmi: w jakim stopniu teoretyczny model kolegialności pasuje do rzeczywistości polskich uniwersytetów, przebadanej na próbie ponad 3 700 polskich reprezentantów kadry akademickiej? Odpowiedź jest kontekstualna i relatywna: pokazujemy polskie uniwersytety w kontekście uniwersytetów funkcjonujących w 10 krajach zachodniej Europy (Austria, Szwajcaria, Irlandia, Holandia, Niemcy, Finlandia, Włochy, Norwegia, Portugalia i Wielka Brytania). Wyłaniający się z badań konflikt między wizją uniwersytetu podzielaną przez wspólnotę akademicką (czyli instytucjonalistycznym modelem „wspólnoty badaczy”, opartym na tradycyjnych wartościach akademickich) a jego wizją podzielaną przez wspólnotę reformatorów i decydentów politycznych (czyli modelem instrumentalnym) ma znaczenie fundamentalne dla losu reform szkolnictwa wyższego w Polsce

Kariera akademicka w Europie: niestabilność w warunkach systemowej konkurencji

The academic labor market is becoming highly competitive, at all levels, rather than as traditionally, in lower academic ranks only. While successive milestones need to be reached, they result more often than ever before from a steady accumulation of research (and also teaching and service) achievements. The academic career ladder seems ever stronger linked to fundraising abilities and research funds made available; consequently, the role of academic mentors or patrons seems crucial. Viewed from a longer historical perspective, academics need to be more aware of processes exogenous to higher education but closely linked to its future, such as changing rationales for public research funding, a revision of a social contract between universities and governments closely linked to the postwar expansion of science in Europe, changing science policies guiding national research priorities, changing perceptions of the utility of research in knowledge economy, and diversified premium for higher education in contemporary economy across different study. Above factors have powerful impact on the current, and especially future, academic labor market, and particularly on its expansion in some areas and contraction in other areas. More volatile, rapidly changing economies certainly mean a less stable and more competitive academic world.Awans naukowy w Europie musi być realizowany systematycznie i umieszczony w jasno zdefiniowanych ramach czasowych; kariery akademickie są podzielone na porównywalne etapy, a każdy z nich musi być realizowany w określonym czasie. Najważniejsze kamienie milowe kariery akademickiej pozostają niezmienne. Podziały istniejące w Polsce nie są radykalnie silniejsze niż w innych częściach Europy. Wszędzie kariera naukowa jest długa, a dochodzenie do naukowej dojrzałości (i instytucjonalnej samodzielności) rozłożone w czasie. Wszędzie młodzi w nauce są wiekowo młodsi i w żadnym nie istnieją „szybkie ścieżki” w nauce. Tradycyjnym kamieniom milowym coraz częściej towarzyszą stałe, małe kroki, niemal nieustannie oceniane przez ciała złożone z przedstawicieli wspólnoty akademickiej i przez uczelnianą administrację. Z jednej strony kariera akademicka jest dziś znacznie mniej stabilna; nie sposób brać dziś w Europie za pewnik długoterminowego zatrudnienia akademickiego, szczególnie w przypadku nowo przyjętych w szeregi kadry akademickiej. Z drugiej jednak strony, kariera akademicka staje się bardziej przewidywalna dzięki silniejszym i bardziej sformalizowanym procesom oceny, którym są poddawane policzalne, porównywalne (zarówno w ramach dyscyplin naukowych w kraju, jak i między krajowymi systemami szkolnictwa wyższego) i międzynarodowo widzialne osiągnięcia badawcze. Tradycyjny kontrakt społeczny państwa z akademią oznaczał spory zakres wolności akademickiej, dużą wolność dysponowania własnym czasem, dużą stabilność zawodową i materialny status klasy średniej. Nowy kontrakt oznacza wycofywanie się państwa ze wszystkich gwarantowanych dotąd wymiarów pracy akademickiej: malejącą wolność akademicką (w sensie rosnącego nacisku na stosowalny, a nie podstawowy charakter badań), mniejszą stabilność zawodową, malejącą władzę dysponowania własnym czasem i spadający status materialny. Tradycyjne motywy prowadzenia badań - triada: curiosity, ribbon i gold - odgrywają taką samą rolę jak w poprzednich dekadach, ale pierwszy i trzeci podlegają systematycznym ograniczeniom

Universities and Welfare States Coping with Permanent Financial Austerity: Pressures on (Competing) Public Institutions

A chapter linking universities and welfare states to permanent financial austerity can take a shorter or a longer historical perspective. This chapter looks further back (to the postwar expansion of European welfare states) to better understand future transformations of both public institutions. Their long-term sustainability problems did not start with the financial crisis of 2008 but have been growing since the 1970s (Schäfer and Streeck 2013; Bonoli and Natali 2012; Hay and Wincott 2012). Financial austerity is not a post-crisis phenomenon. As a concept, it was used in welfare state research at least a decade earlier, although it does not seem to have been used in higher education studies until recently. Two quotations bring us to the heart of the matter: welfare states and universities are currently changing under adverse financial conditions caused by an array of interrelating and mutually reinforcing forces and their long-term financial sustainability is at stake across Europe. The welfare state is a “particular trademark of the European social model” (Svallfors 2012: 1), “the jewel in the crown” and a “fundamental part of what Europe stands for” (Giddens 2006: 14), as are tuition-free universities, the cornerstone of intergenerational social mobility in Continental Europe. The past trajectories of major types of welfare states and of universities in Europe tend to go hand in hand: first vastly expanding following the Second World War, and especially in the 1960s and 1970s, and then being in the state of permanent resource-driven and legitimacy-based “crisis” in the last two decades. Welfare states and universities, two critically important public institutions, seem to be under heavy attacks from the public, the media and politicians. Their long-term sustainability is being questioned, and solutions to their (real and perceived) problems are being sought at global, European, and national levels

"Strong Research Performers” vs. “Strong Teaching Performers” in European Higher Education: a Comparative Quantitative Perspective

Teaching and research are still the two fundamental dimensions of the academic enterprise, despite the increasing role of various, as they are termed in Europe, “third mission activities” (Kwiek 2013). Few academic studies of the academic profession have addressed the nexus of teaching and research from a consistently quantitative perspective. Most comparative studies available until recently were either focused on a small cluster of countries or based on qualitative material combined with publicly available statistical data. At a European level, studies were either of a general nature and based on often incompatible national methodologies, or referred to rela-tively simple, aggregated data produced by the OECD or the EUROSTAT, the European Commission’s statistical office. This paper explores the teaching/research nexus in European systems through large-scale comparative data on the research and teaching time allocation (academic behaviors) and teaching or research role orientation (aca-demic attitudes)

The Prestige Economy of Higher Education Journals: A Quantitative Approach

This study addresses stratification in the global higher education research community and the changing geography of country affiliations in six elite journals. The distribution of country affiliations is analyzed from a longitudinal perspective (1996–2018), and full-time and part-authors in the field are contrasted. The prestige maximization model and principal-agent theory provide the theoretical framework for the study, which examines 6,334 articles published in six elite journals in the context of 21,442 articles in 41 core journals. The findings indicate that about 3.3% of academics have authored at least five articles (full-timers). These authors constitute the publishing core of the research community, while the 80% who have authored one article (part-timers) constitute its periphery. Higher Education (HE) and Studies in Higher Education (SHE) emerge as elite global journals, with an increasing share of non-Anglo-Saxon authors. Previously globally invisible countries became visible almost exclusively through HE and SHE. Global trends include the diminishing role of American researchers and the increasing role of researchers from Continental Europe, East Asia, and the cluster of 66 “other” countries. The single biggest affiliation loser is the US, which had 42.5% of country affiliations in 1996–2003 but only 26.9% in 2012–2018. This reflects both the increasing share of non-American affiliations and the increasing yearly volume of HE and SHE publications, in which US academics tend not to publish.128Higher Educatio

Internationalists and Locals: International Research Collaboration in a Resource-Poor System

The principal distinction drawn in this study is between research “internationalists” and “locals.” The former are scientists involved in international research collaboration while the latter group are not. These two distinct types of scientist compete for academic prestige, research funding, and international recognition. International research collaboration proves to be a powerful stratifying force. As a clearly defined subgroup, internationalists are a different academic species, accounting for 51.4% of Polish scientists; predominantly male and older, they have longer academic experience and higher academic degrees and occupy higher academic positions. Across all academic clusters, internationalists consistently produce more than 90% of internationally co-authored publications, representing 2,320% of locals’ productivity for peer-reviewed articles and 1,600% for peer-reviewed article equivalents. Internationalists tend to spend less time than locals on teaching-related activities, more time on research, and more time on administrative duties. Based on a large-scale academic survey (N = 3,704), some new predictors of international research collaboration were identified by multivariate analyses. The findings have global policy implications for resource-poor science systems “playing catch-up” in terms of academic careers, productivity patterns, and research internationalization policies.125149Scientometric

An Abundance of Doctoral Students But a Scarcity of Doctorates

The massification of doctoral studies in Poland has not led to an equivalent increase in doctoral degrees. While the number of doctoral students increased steadily through the 1990s and 2000s, the number of doctorates awarded did not follow suit. Many students entered doctoral programs, but only a minority were ever awarded the degree, as most either dropped out or completed the program but did not defend their dissertation. This disparity between entrants and doctoral degrees awarded is central to understanding the emergent tensions around doctoral education in the Polish context. Based on international comparative statistics, the current intake of 43,000 doctoral students combines overproduction of doctoral students and a scarcity of doctorates. In the Polish context, only one in four doctoral students are ultimately awarded a doctoral degree. It follows that the processes affecting the distribution of doctoral education differ from those that determine the distribution of doctorates. The emergent tensions reveal the fundamental difference between the changing higher education system in terms of teaching (where the Bologna Process places doctoral education) and research (where doctorates awarded belong). In Poland, there is the further difference of national statistics, as fields of study used to report doctoral student numbers differ from those used to report doctorates awarded. What has changed fundamentally during this time, however, is the gender composition of doctorate holders, with a gradually increasing share of female doctorates. While 31% of doctorates in 1990 were awarded to females, the percentage rose after a decade of change—to 42% in 2000, and to 53% by 2010. From a gender perspective, the turning point was 2008 when, for the first time in the history of Polish science, the number of female doctorates exceeded the number of male doctorates. Currently, reforms are accelerating and the expectation is that public funding for both higher education and for academic research will be higher. In the center of the reform package there is a concept of competition: between research teams, academic units and institutions, with a new model of academic research assessment to be applied in 2021. The concept includes also new doctoral schools competing for public subsidies and top minds