Rikard Lingström, Vice President of SULF, calls for change in the research and education environment in the country and to the treatment of doctoral students Universities play a unique role, providing high-quality education and making research that would not have been performed at private companies or research institutes possible. This research is fundamental and innovative, but most probably will not generate revenue for investors in the short term. In the long term, however, such research may be extremely valuable to society, and not only from an economic aspect.
Moreover, the relationship between research and education is individual and has to be strong, meaning that university teachers must be given the opportunity to both perform research and to teach.
Policies on higher education and research in Sweden do not, in general, promote long-term fundamental research, especially not innovative research. Neither is a strong link between research and higher education advocated, instead policies appear to exert their influence in the opposite direction.
Allocation of funding The amount of funding allocated to research at universities in Sweden has decreased over the last few decades. Total spending on research and development is still high from an international perspective, at 3.6% of GDP; however more than two-thirds of this is spent by private companies, the majority of which are a small number of large companies. Only approximately one-quarter of research spending is linked to activities at universities, which amounts to less than 1% of GDP. This level is not high from an international perspective, particularly given that the Swedish research institute sector is small compared to other European countries.
The Swedish Government, like many other governments, claims to promote excellent research and innovation at universities. Policies and the allocation system for new research funding have, during recent years, been focused on strengthening already strong research areas by allotting more funding to them as designated by the government. In addition, for some years, the allocation of a part of research funding is determined with regard to external grants and to bibliometrics, for example the number of publications and citations. Neither of these models promotes innovative research, but instead benefits 'mainstream' research.
Departments and groups that are already well-funded have received much of this capital as well. This has occurred to the extent that, in many cases, these departments have not been able to spend all the funding they have received. Currently, there is one year of unused funding on the balance sheets of Swedish universities. The government has been criticised for this by the National Audit Office, who have used similar arguments.
The research-teaching relationship Higher education is, by definition, intimately related to research at higher education institutions. In order to improve the quality of Swedish higher education, research must be considered seriously: it is very important that teachers are active researchers and vice versa. Teachers should be articulating the scientific problems that are involved in the research agendas at their institutions. A relationship to research through a PhD is not enough. Neither is it enough to merely follow research through papers, seminars and conferences. Of course, this does not mean that teachers can or should divide their time into two equal parts. Different areas have different needs at different points in time; however the definition should be clear: university teachers should carry out both teaching and research.
Policies and allocation systems have to promote a strong relationship between research and education. In fact, however, recent policies on research and education have promoted the exact opposite: universities that either focus on research or education. In some research areas, particularly in the fields of medicine and technology, and at the older universities, the share of total funding spent on research is very often extremely high. These areas, which are also the winners as a result of the new research policies, very often spend 80% or more on research. On the other hand, at other departments, very often at the smaller universities, the relationship between research and education is the opposite. Thus the desirable strong relationship between research and education is not achieved.
Sweden needs research policies that promote the unique role of universities, supporting fundamental, long-term and innovative research and the strong relationship between research and education.
Equal access for all Doctoral education plays a key role for research conducted at universities in Sweden. According to Statistics Sweden, more than 40% of research carried out at universities is performed by the 17,000 doctoral candidates. The country is known for showing a high level of equality, but this is a tradition that is not followed as regards doctoral education. Swedish doctoral education demonstrates high levels of inequality in various different ways.
Over the course of the last few years, the number of foreign doctoral candidates from countries outside the EU has increased. Unfortunately, these doctoral candidates are very often accepted under conditions that are significantly worse than the conditions that apply to most Swedish doctoral candidates. Funded by scholarships from their home countries, they not only lack social benefits in Sweden, their level of income is very often less than half the salary of a Swedish doctoral candidate. These candidates are very important to Swedish research, but are severely mistreated in comparison to their Swedish colleagues. The government could change this situation by revising the Higher Education Ordinance; however, it has so far chosen to accept it.
There is also a lack of equality regarding the social background of the doctoral candidates when it comes to the educational background of their parents. Approximately 6% of university students at Master's level continue their studies at doctoral level, but the difference with regard to their backgrounds is huge. Among students who have at least one PhD graduate parent, 16% continued to doctoral level; but only 4% of working class students continued their studies.
This situation cannot be explained in a few sentences; and is also similar at undergraduate level. Consequently, the social bias in recruitment to university studies in Sweden is almost as significant as it was 40 years ago. Sweden, a country that is renowned for showing a high level of equality, has not succeeded in this very important task – recruiting students from all parts of society.