What is science worth for us?
Jack Spaapen, senior policy advisor, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Since the 1990s, policy makers progressively became interested in assessing scientific research not only on its merits for the scientific community, but also for society at large. However, we still do not have a widely accepted, systematic way to assess scientific impact. So why is it so difficult to assess impact of research?
The main reason is that there are so many different kinds of impact, depending on the societal context. Clearly, this goes for researchers working in, say, medical fields compared to those working in agriculture or ICT. But it goes a fortiori for researchers working in the broad array of humanities and social science (HSS) fields. Researchers who work in language departments and want to have an impact on the language curriculum of high schools have to deal with legal and governmental departments, with school boards, with student...
“Productivity” is a word that gets thrown around a lot, especially in times of economic uncertainty. Governments, financial institutions and media commentators are all concerned with measuring, increasing and stimulating Canada’s productivity. But what does the concept of productivity actually mean beyond a gross domestic product (GDP)? Karen Foster, one of this year’s Banting Postdoctoral Fellows, will tackle this question during her research at Saint Mary’s University. The title of her post-doctoral research project is “Beyond the numbers: the meaning and measure of productivity in Canada.”
Over the past decade, border crossing has become a national security concern of growing importance, with states increasingly turning to surveillance technologies, databases and smart IDs to control migration flows. Criticism about the increased securitization of borders is generally levelled at states, which, according to 2012 Banting Postdoctoral Fellow Martin Geiger, ignores a major player in migration management – industry.
Laure Guirguis, née d’une mère française et d’un père égyptien chrétien, parle l’arabe et a régulièrement séjourné en Égypte depuis son enfance.
With innovations like babies with three genetic parents, what is reality in the field of reproductive technology today seems like it would have been science fiction mere decades ago. And while reproductive technology has helped thousands of couples with reproductive issues, same sex couples and single parents start families, policy and research around the field is lagging. One area of concern that remains largely unaddressed is the international human egg trade and its implications for women on both sides of the transaction.