The refocusing of the National Research Council to a more targeted role that is linked much more to shorter-term, business-driven applied research in selected industries has served to reinforce the view that the Harper government is not particularly interested in advancing fundamental knowledge, but much more interested in immediate improvements in innovation and competitiveness of Canadian companies.
Some of these concerns are valid, but so is the government’s desire to improve innovation performance in Canadian companies because that is where new jobs and prosperity will come from. These issues, though, are really part of a bigger debate on the broader relationship between government and science and how this is managed in a representative democracy. The problem is that an open debate is not taking place. Take the refocusing of the role of the NRC.
The fact that its role has been undergoing intense review should not shock us. It is a key responsibility of boards and management in the public and private sectors to regularly examine the value their organization delivers and whether what was important a decade earlier will be the proper mandate over the next decade or longer. And when an organization changes its focus, there is inevitable internal and external disagreement, as well as job losses and job creation. Absent a constant review of value, an organization will cease to have relevance.
So the key question is whether the new direction for NRC makes the most sense and, more broadly, how choices are made in overall science spending. The problem is that the NRC, like the federal government generally, is not committed to what we would call open government and full public disclosure.
For example, what we need from the NRC is a document that clearly sets out the business plan for refocused NRC—the rationale for change, how it will be implemented, and what activities will be enhanced and what will be reduced or closed. We need to see what kinds of revenue forecasts NRC is projecting from a greater role for industry and how intellectual property will be managed, for example. This, rather than boastful assertions about the NRC’s plans, would help Canadians determine whether the NRC was on the right course.
Instead, John McDougall, who was put in charge of the NRC by the Harper government in 2010 with the task of restructuring NRC, is creating both confusion and consternation over his “refocusing” of Canada’s most important public research body.
Many observers are still trying to figure out what McDougall is really up to. The fact that he wants better ties with business is not controversial. NRC scientists are accustomed to working with business. But in his dismissal of past NRC efforts in fundamental science and his repositioning of the NRC as an agency to support business-applied research, he does not appear to understand the close linkages between basic and applied research. Take his comment in an Ottawa Citizen interview earlier this year. “The discovery part of everything we are going to do for the next couple of decades is already discovered,” he contended. There’s no doubt that there will be much incremental innovation as companies continue to seek new uses from existing scientific discoveries. But many uses of existing knowledge will depend on ongoing research into fundamental science. It’s not an either/or process.
These issues for publicly-funded research were set out in a brilliant small book published in 1997 called Pasteur’s Quadrant: Basic Science and Technological Development. In it, the author, Donald Stokes, shows how the traditional portrayal of the linkages between basic research and innovation—the so-called linear model in which government puts money into basic research, which becomes the basis for applied research, which leads to development and technology, and, in turn, applications, which result in business, jobs and social benefits, was out of date.
Stokes noted that there have always been scientists who pursued pure research, such as Niels Bohr, without any thought about usefulness, scientists who pursued basic research to solve actual problems and then applied the research, such as Louis Pasteur, and those who aggressively pursued just applied research, such as Thomas Edison. Pasteur’s Quadrant outlines the role of basic science aiming to understand and advance underlying scientific knowledge to make society better off as a result and its link to today’s Edisons. Pasteur is the prime example, with his pursuit of fundamental understanding in order to bring improved public health. Much of scientific history is about purpose-driven basic research.
In fact, Stokes argued, basic and applied research are closely linked, with basic research leading to advances in technology, and applied research and technology requiring further advances from basic research, while at the same time, advances in applied research sparking new challenges for basic research. Both are critical. A successful society will invest in both.
The real question is how Canada meets these parallel needs through a more open relationship between science and government in a democratic society where accountability should include not only on how public money is spent but on how public choices are made.
Original Article
Source: hilltimes.com
Author: David Crane
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