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Predictions are made that the next driver of economic changes in the world would be knowledge. Science, as a creative endeavour, is undergoing changes globally in preparing world for competitive knowledge economies. Nation states are investing heavily into Research and Development for gaining competitive advantages over other countries through intellectual property rights. Planned national efforts are made to position countries high in global ranks in Research and Development space. National strength in R&D is truly built by strengthening of institutions for gaining high global ranks. R&D being a creative human endeavour, the individual effort remains the upper most and critical factor determining global ranks of either institutions or even Nations in R&D space.
Various nation states are committing to invest >2 % of Gross Domestic Product into R&D. Comparisons of data of 38 Nations reveal that no country with less than 1200 Full Time Equivalent of R&D personnel/million population is able to invest more than 2% of GDP into R&D. Global ranking of Nations is based on both investments and Science, Technology and Innovation output indicators. An attempt would be made to analyse some of the factors and practices involved in such ranking processes in global R&D space and discuss the consequences and suitability as well as sustainability of resource intensive models adopted by the world. An attempt would also be made to discuss possible measures for an emerging country like India with aspiration to rise as important knowledge power through performances in R&D. A Resource-optimized model would be introduced.
Urge among educational and research institutions in the developing world to gain global visibility by ascending the ladder of relative performance on a global scale is intense. It is an important priority Two models of excellence namely surpassing others at a particular time on relative merits and out-performing oneself perpetually in absolute terms exist. Opportunity for balancing between the two models seems interesting. Some indicative measures for implementation by institutions aspiring to emerge as a top ranking R&D institution would be discussed.
Performance of institutions depends critically upon the performance of individual and groups of researchers. Global methods of assessing and measuring performance of individual professionals would be outlined. Inter-relationships among global ranks of individuals, institutions and Nation would be discussed.
Format for discussions would be in the form of conversations. It is proposed to package conversations on the subject into a total of 5 one-hour long interactions each. Part 1a and 1b would discuss global ranking as Nations and a Model for India, respectively. Part 2 and Part 3 would discuss the issue in terms of institutions and individual, respectively. The last part would be developed based on the interest of IISER Kolkata as a separate lecture cum discussions on what might be relevant to the local context based on feed-back from the institute.
What is planned is sharing of data based analysis and possible measures for the country, Institutions, individuals and IISER Kolkata. The lecture is expected to offer some inputs for those managing institutions as well as aspiring individuals while providing a global context to the conversations. A flavour of changing circumstances in India and world would be exposed through data on S&T performance indicators in the exposition. Format and contents of the conversation are likely to be of interest to those seeking a bigger picture. A general understanding of the issue rather than prescriptions for specific actions would be the focus this series of lectures.
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