DE UN CANCIONERO APÓCRIFO
JUAN DE MAIRENA,
The objective defined for this evaluation is to strengthen Norwegian development research. The sections below discuss the needs and opportunities for improvements related to five topics defined in the Terms of Reference:
1. How can quality be enhanced? 2. How can relevance be enhanced?
3. How can internationalisation be strengthened? 4. How can focus/identity be improved?
5. How can the role played by research on developing countries and development issues in Norwegian research policy be strengthened?
Under each topic, RCN, other national authorities, and relevant research communities, are addressed, and measures for improvement are recommended – in response to the request in the Terms of Reference for “recommendations on strategic aims, priorities, organisation and resources”.
8.2.1 How can quality be enhanced?
In general, the units included in this evaluation conduct a substantial amount of good quality research. There are still some weaknesses in their framework conditions that should be resolved: first, the small proportion of funding allocated through open calls for
proposals and based on academic quality review only, and second, the fragmentation of the Norwegian research community.
Recommendations directed at the RCN and national authorities
The scope for undertaking independent critical research is vital for ensuring high quality. An arm-length’s distance between development research and Norwegian authorities should be better assured, and the role of government officials on programme boards should be reconsidered, including reconsideration of the need for such representation. At a minimum, all members of the selection committees should fully recognise and agree to the primacy of academic quality criteria. In line with this, RCN should more clearly emphasise that academic quality is the
most important selection criterion in its development research programmes, and better communicate the requirements for a methodological and theoretical foundation of the project proposals. On the other hand, the rejection rates seem normal, and there should be no reason to complain about high rejection rates. Given the significance of funding issues for the quality of Norwegian development
research, there is reason to review the current structure used to channel money to researchers throughRCN. In any such review, consideration should be given to making more funding available for researcher-initiated project ideas that may not fall within ongoing programme funding parameters as well as setting aside money for building or strengthening research milieus through 5-10 year long grants. Clearer emphasis on quality and long-term grants offered on a competitive basis
would be an adequate measure for attracting and building competence in the presently fragmented Norwegian research structure:
- A larger share of the resources should be allocated through open calls for proposals within development research and be based on academic quality criteria only. This implies that open calls for research proposals within development research should be the main RCN alternative. To the extent that RCN is obliged to establish programmes devoted to specific themes within development research, these themes should be as comprehensive as possible. - Setting aside long-term funding (5-10 years) is vital to building up capacity and
ensuring the researchers’ ability to have a long-term focus on development research. The funding should also facilitate international and domestic collaboration.
Moreover, permanent positions and sufficient core funding are important for making the research milieus more viable and capable of sustaining a congenial research environment.
Recommendations directed at the research communities
A stronger focus on international collaboration, as well as on domestic project collaborations/staff mobility/affiliated staff should be maintained.
To facilitate a more long-term research focus, the research units should reserve some of their core funding for development research.
8.2.2 How can relevance be enhanced?
Recommendations directed at the RCN and national authorities
There is a need to address the fact that Norway has a very high profile on aid and development, but very little independent critical research on these issues.
Measures should be taken to ensure an arms-length distance between research institutions and official policy-making, as well as independent investigations into the efficiency of aid and development policy.
Relevance should be understood in a broader context. Relevance refers to more than just the perceived short-term needs of users. Other results can be extremely relevant, e.g. free independent evaluations, critical capacity building, as well as social relevance and the forming of social opinions in a broader sense.
There is a need for better structures for input on policy formulation, but
researchers and policy makers should meet in arenas other than the funding arenas. Relationships characterised by dependency should be avoided, and the conditions for independent critical research and broader relevance should be ensured. National authorities and the central aid organisations should, in cooperation with
the research community, try to develop more efficient channels for communicating research to users groups, enhancing user competence and improving the basis for use of research results.
Recommendations directed at the research communities
The research community should continue to address relevance in broad terms. As stated above in the recommendations to the authorities, relevance encompasses much more than simply what the users’ request.
The research community should continue to insist on the interrelationship between quality and relevance. The ability to conduct good basic research is a prerequisite for conducting good applied research. Competence building for development research in Norway is one of the most important ways in which the research community can ensure relevance – to recruit more talented individuals and give them training in development research.
To avoid an uncritical and one-sided research focus, the research units should take care to maintain a greater critical distance from Norwegian aid authorities. Too much mobility may distort independent, critical research.
8.2.3 How can internationalisation be strengthened?
The general level of internationalisation in Norwegian development research seems to be high. Norway is also a “good citizen” in the international development society and good at placing people abroad – and this pays off. The challenges in this area are of a general nature, and most of them probably apply to Norwegian research as a whole, not only to development research.
Recommendations directed at the RCN and national authorities
Continue to support projects that facilitate international collaboration. Recommendations directed at the research communities
Researchers should be encouraged both to attract international funding and to publish internationally. Also, the university departments should try to attract more international funding.
Norwegian development research institutions can benefit from greater interaction and cooperation with universities or research institutes in the South as well as the North.
8.2.4 How can focus and identity be improved?
As the basic structures for development are changing (Section 6.3), the focus and identity of development research should be reconsidered.
Recommendations directed at the RCN and national authorities
The individual researchers should be given more leeway to define the research agenda by developing innovative projects that would have an impact on
mainstream disciplinary studies or interdisciplinary studies, as well as on policy thinking.
By including open calls for proposals, the process of seeking funds will become less supply-driven and thus enhance ownership of the research enterprise, which is important for sustaining the development research identity.
Recommendations directed at the research communities
Rethink the boundaries of development research with regard to its scope and focus, and broaden the field to include issues raised by globalisation that link the North and the South, the East and the West in new ways and by considering human-environment-security perspectives.
A clearer acceptance that research on development issues is part of the mainstream social sciences is needed. This does not necessarily imply an abandonment of interdisciplinarity, but it does involve recasting the research agenda in such a way that it becomes more comparative and addresses issues of interest to those in the mainstream disciplines.
8.2.5 How can the role of development research in research policy be strengthened?
Whereas development research has a central role in Norwegian development policy, at present it has only a marginal role in Norwegian research policy.
Recommendations directed at the RCN and national authorities
Basic development research should be given priority irrespective of immediate policy relevance.
Future policy making needs to take into account that capacity building and the ability to acquire long-term funding and conduct long-term independent research represent the bottleneck in Norwegian development research, not the overall amount of resources available.
Recommendations directed at the research communities
The research community needs to insist that quality and relevance are interrelated, and consciously fight for a separate role for development research in Norwegian research policy, not only in Norwegian aid policy.