Research Users, Producers and Funders: Challenges to Scientific Research in British Universities |
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| Abstract: | Scientific research in universities is undergoing a process of restructuring. To a large extent this process is driven by the changing roles of research funders, research producers and research users. Business is the dominant producer of research, government - through departmental research agencies and research council institutes - is second in importance and universities are relatively minor producers. However, in all sectors there is a process of fragmentation through which independent research producers are emerging. The balance of research funding in the last decade or so has shifted relatively from the dominance of government to the dominance of business, with a growing relative contribution from charities and from overseas. But this diversification of funding has taken place within a broadly stable aggregate level. Research users have started behaving much more as research customers: it is estimated that eighty three per cent of British scientific research is purchased by those in business or government, who wish to use it very directly in their work. These changes pose challenges to the traditional view of university research as a public good or a cultural enterprise; increasingly it is becoming a mode of economic production. |
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