Internationalism,Environmental Necessity,and National Interest: Marine Science and Other Sciences

In 1902, eight northern European nations formed the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES). A turn-of-the-century international movement created opportunities, funding, and political support for marine science. This paper uses ICES as a lens for examining international cooperation, and shows how its sponsors benefited from the intersection of internationalist ideals, national interest, and the characteristics of the marine environment. Marine science is then compared to other field sciences to explore how these three factors promoted internationalism in science more generally.     

The Prestige of Social Scientists in Spain and France: An Examination of Their h-Index Values Using Scopus and Google Scholar

We analyze the prestige of 1,500 scholars in economics, sociology, and management who have Spanish and French institutional affiliations operationalized by their h-index in Scopus and Google Scholar. We use a negative binomial count model to examine how some individual factors affect the h-index from both databases. The results show a non-monotonic relationship between the researchers’ career length and their h-index. There is a positive and statistically significant relationship between total research output and the h-index. The share of publications in English over total publications has also a positive and statistically significant effect on the h-index, except in a single case, while the share of publications in other foreign languages does not have such effect. Finally, we found that the effects of the number of citations received by documents in English (international impact) and by those in the vernacular language (local or regional impact) on the h-index vary according to the database, the country, and the discipline in question.

     

National,Regional and Global Perspectives of Higher Education and Science Policies in the Arab Region

In this paper we discuss the interaction between science policies (and particularly in the area of scientific research) and higher education policies in Gulf and Mediterranean Arab countries. Our analysis reveals a discrepancy between the two sub-regions with respect to integration in the global market, cooperation in scientific research and international mobility of students. The paper discusses the implications of the analysis of reform policies and higher education restructuring.     

The Society for the Protection of Science and Learning and the Politicization of British Science in the 1930s

The Society for the Protection of Science and Learning was begun in London in 1933, and became a key agency in the international effort to rescue refugee scholars. The SPSL also raised political awareness among British scientists, uniting many voices in the struggle against the Nazi assault on academic freedom. This paper traces the evolution of the Society from 1933 to 1939.     

Cognitive and Social Structure of the Elite Collaboration Network of Astrophysics: A Case Study on Shifting Network Structures

Scientific collaboration can only be understood along the epistemic and cognitive grounding of scientific disciplines. New scientific discoveries in astrophysics led to a major restructuring of the elite network of astrophysics. To study the interplay of the epistemic grounding and the social network structure of a discipline, a mixed-methods approach is necessary. It combines scientometrics, quantitative network analysis and visualization tools with a qualitative network analysis approach. The centre of the international collaboration network of astrophysics is demarcated by identifying the 225 most productive astrophysicists. For the years 1998?C1999 and 2001?C2006 four co-authorship networks are constructed comprehending each a two year period. A visualization of the longitudinal network data gives first hints on the structural development of the network. The network of 2005?C2006 is analyzed in depth. Based on cohesion analysis tools for network analysis, two main cores and three smaller ones are identified. Scientists in each core and additionally in structurally interesting positions are identified and 17 qualitative expert interviews are conducted with them. The visualization of the network of 2005?C2006 is used in the interviews as a stimulus for the interviewees. An analysis of the three most often used keywords of the 225 astrophysicists is included and combined with the other data. The triangulation of these approaches shows that major epistemic changes in astrophysics, e.g. the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe, together with technical and organizational innovations, leads to a restructuring of the network of the discipline. The importance of a combination of qualitative and quantitative network analysis tools for the understanding of the interplay of cognitive and social structure in the sociology of science is substantiated.     

The Grudging Modernizer: A Trip to the Middle East and Cold War Social Science

Minerva - The postwar era is generally recognized as a unique moment of impetuous growth of the social sciences, due to the interest of Western internationalist elites in the development of a set...     

The Ethics Ecosystem: Personal Ethics,Network Governance and Regulating Actors Governing the Use of Social Media Research Data

Minerva - This paper examines the consequences of a culture of “personal ethics” when using new methodologies, such as the use of social media (SM) sites as a source of data for...     

Science and Social Space: Transformations in the Institutions of Wissenschaft from the Wilhelmine Empire to the Weimar Republic

Between the 1880s and the 1920s, the German system of scientific research, traditionally dominated by the universities, underwent rapid institutional change and functional differentiation. This paper analyses this development as a constitutive factor in Germany’s transition from a predominantly industrial to a primarily ‘knowledge-based’ society. This perspective broadens and deepens our understanding of the current debate concerning the social production of knowledge.     

The Pacific Science Board in Micronesia: Science,Government, and Conservation on the Post-War Pacific Frontier

This article examines the planningand execution of scientific field work in thepost-war Micronesian Trust Territory, under theaegis of the Pacific Science Board (within theNational Research Council). It argues that thework of the PSB can be characterized as both`big natural history', and routine `frontierscience' in that scientific expertise wasintended to aid in managing the Trust. It alsoexamines the limitations of scientists whostruggled to extend American conservation andpreservation strategies on distant Pacificfrontier territories.     

Towards a Culture of Application: Science and Decision Making at the National Institute of Standards &; Technology

How does the research performed by a government mission agency contribute to useable technologies for its constituents? Is it possible to incorporate science policy mechanisms for increasing benefits to users in the decision process? The United States National Institute of Standards &; Technology (NIST) promises research directed towards industrial application. This paper considers the processes that produce science and technology at NIST. The institute’s policies for science provide robust examples for how effective science policies can contribute to the emergence of useful technologies. To progress towards technologies that can be years away, the agency uses several means for integrating the needs of eventual information users into the prioritization process. To accomplish this, NIST units, such as the Materials Science and Engineering Laboratory, incorporate mechanisms for considering user need and project impact into different stages of its scientific decision processes. This, and other specific strategies that the agency utilizes for connecting the supply of science to information demand, provide lessons for generating useable science.     

Economics of music publishing: copyright and the market

The paper argues that the paradigmatic shift from the sale of printed music to exploiting and managing musical rights that took place in music publishing during the early years of the twentieth century was due to the changing market rather than to changes in copyright law. On the one hand, copyright law was ineffectual in controlling piracy throughout the nineteenth century, and on the other hand, performing rights were ignored by music publishers for over 70 years; these points suggest that copyright was not the main reason behind the success of the industry. Rather than leading entrepreneurially (the current view of dynamism in the creative industries), publishers ‘followed the money’ and adapted their business models only when new streams of income from new forms of exploitation through sound recording, broadcasting and film became available as a result of exogenous technical progress. Publishers were locked-in to sales revenue as their business model, though when switching to the new business model of rights management took place, the costs seem not to have been greatly significant. The paper takes an historical approach to the development of music publishing viewed through the lens of present-day issues. The research has resonance for the transition from sales to licensing digital works that is taking place in the creative industries today and puts into perspective the relative significance of market forces and copyright law in the process.