The limits to internationalization of scientific research collaboration

This study analyses international research collaboration for eight science-based technologies in the Netherlands for the period 1988–2004. It is found that the share of international research collaborations in research collaboration is high, but not rising during the period investigated. This result suggests that the process of internationalization has reached an end. It is also found that collaboration between academic and non-academic organizations is less likely to take place at the international level than collaboration between academic organizations. This suggests that collaborating within national research systems helps academia, firms and governmental organizations to overcome differences in norms, values and incentives. Nonetheless, international collaboration between academic and non-academic organizations is also frequently occurring. Some consider these collaborations as undesirable, insofar academic research funded domestically is ‘leaking’ to foreign firms in such research collaborations. Such unwanted knowledge spillovers has lead some to plea for a ‘technology-nationalism’ in science policy instead of a ‘techno-globalization’. An analysis of the ‘balance of trade’ in international collaborations between Dutch academia and foreign firms and between Dutch firms and foreign academia shows that fears for unwanted knowledge spillovers are unfounded.

Impact evaluations in South Korea and China

While evidence-based policy-making is increasingly in demand, as new policies are required to bring effective results to targeted groups in South Korea and China, few studies have investigated the progress of quantitative impact evaluation that focuses on causality. This paper studies the trends of quantitative impact evaluation of public policy in South Korea and China by surveying major public administration and public policy journals in these two countries from 2000 to 2015. Among published articles in the major journals, our study pool includes research articles directly related to quantitative impact evaluation. Our study found that there has been considerable progress in impact evaluation research in South Korea and China in both data quality and empirical methods. However, empirical impact evaluation still comprises a small fraction (only one to two percent) of all research in public administration and public policy in both countries. We also found limited discussion on the selection mechanism and related bias in South Korea even in recent years, while causality and selection bias have been more commonly discussed in China. Also, advanced empirical methods are more frequently observed in journal articles in China than those in South Korea.     

Do consultancies compromise academic research and ethics? A case study of Burma/Myanmar*

This paper contributes to ongoing debates about interactions between the political science discipline and policymaking communities by analysing the role played by scholars who work as consultants for governments, non-governmental organizations, and international aid agencies in conflict-affected and post-conflict societies. It argues that although consultancies permit scholars to engage with policy communities and provide convenient access for data collection, they also present methodological constraints and can complicate and compromise research ethics due to the inherent tensions linking the two different realms with their differing norms, agendas, and goals. The findings are based on the author’s decades of field experience in Myanmar, a country which has recently received much attention from the international community, on interviews with nine PhD candidates or PhD holders who have been employed as consultants for aid agencies in Myanmar and Southeast Asia, and analysis of secondary sources on countries with similar situations.     

The Genealogy of Colonial Plunder and Erasure – Israel's Control over Palestinian Archives

The essay discusses one characteristic of colonial archives – how the ruling state plunders/loots the colonized’ archives and treasures and controls them in its colonial archives - erasing them from the public sphere by repressive means, censors and restricts their exposure and use, alters their original identity, regulates their contents and subjugates them to colonizer’s laws, rules and terminology. It focuses on two archives plundered by Israel in Beirut in 1980s: the Palestine Research Center and archive of Palestinian films. The essay continues my earlier research on Palestinian visual (and other) archives taken as booty or looted by pre-state Jewish military organizations and soldiers or civilians in the first half of the twentieth century, especially during the Nakba (the Palestinian catastrophe, 1948), and later by Israel’s military bodies. It analyzes the plunder itself while focusing on the power relations reflected toward the hybrid gazes of the colonizer and the colonized and discusses colonial features of military archives holding and controlling seized materials. While colonial museums have been largely discussed, and also archives holding colonial history, this is one of the first essays to discuss features of colonial archives holding plundered archives/material.     

“It Was My Understanding That There Would Be No Math”: Using Thematic Cases to Teach Undergraduate Research Methods

Undergraduates frequently approach research methods classes with trepidation and skepticism, owing in part to math-phobia and confusion over how methodology is relevant to their interests. These self-defeating barriers to learning undermine the efficacy of methods classes. This essay discusses a strategy for overcoming these barriers—use of a case study as a thematic framework for the class. In theory, the case study engages students and renders the material less abstract. A research methods class recently taught by the author was organized around political assassinations, with an initial framing focus the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In an end of semester Qualtrics survey, students reported that they liked this approach and believe that it kept them interested in the material.

“[S]tats are dry. The Kennedys are not dry.” ～A student     

Switzerland in the European Research Area: Integration Without Legislation

From the point of view of modes of governance and constellations of interdependence, EU research policy offers ideal conditions for the flexible inclusion of non‐member states: it is based on transgovernmental coordination through policy networks rather than supranational legislation, it follows scientific rather than political imperatives, and cooperation is in the interest of both the EU and of Switzerland. This article analyses the degree to which these factors have allowed for Switzerland's inclusion into the regulatory and organisational aspects of EU research policy, and highlights the limits of such flexible sectoral integration.     

The Challenge of Adolescent Crowd Research: Defining the Crowd

As research on adolescent crowds has increased over the past several decades, researchers appear to be confident in their claims of the consequences of crowd membership, even suggesting targeted interventions. This review of the various methods used to identify adolescents’ crowd membership suggests that this confidence may be misplaced. There are diverse methodologies used in this research area that examine different samples of adolescents belonging to each crowd. Social-type rating methods, self-identification methods, grouping by adolescent behaviors or characteristics, and ethnographic or other qualitative methods should be accompanied by greater specificity in terminology to alert researchers to the various phenomena being studied (i.e., “reputational crowd,” “interactional crowd,” “behavioral crowd,” “affiliation crowd”). Additionally, studies comparing the various self-identification approaches and peer ratings are needed, along with reliability studies of peer ratings. More attention to specific methodology to determine crowd membership and its stability will aid the design of theoretical models of adolescent crowds and contribute to developmental outcome research.

1979～2012年中国有关朝鲜半岛问题的研究状况--基于“中国知网”相关文献的分析

本文以“中国知网”收录的有关朝鲜半岛问题的学术文献为研究对象,考察1979 ～2012年中国学界对朝鲜半岛问题的研究状况.在指标上,本文选取论文发表数量的年代分布、论文选题的主题分布、论文发文量居前6位的作者分布、论文发文量居前10位的单位分布、论文发文量居前10位的期刊分布、有关韩国研究和朝鲜研究的变迁对比这6个指标.通过对这些指标的详细考察,结论部分对1979 ～2012年中国有关朝鲜半岛问题研究的趋势和状况进行了基本描述,并从机制建设、研究方法革新、研究侧重点加强等几个层面提出了下一步研究时的建议.     

试论毒品检验在禁毒中的情报作用

禁毒离不开情报 ,情报工作是禁毒工作中的重要组成部分 ,对禁毒工作起着信息支持作用 ,对打击毒品犯罪具有举足轻重的作用。毒品检验是刑事科学技术工作的组成部分 ,是揭露和证实毒品犯罪的重要技术手段 ,在禁毒斗争中具有十分重要的情报作用。本文研究介绍几种毒品检验方法和特点 ,以论证毒品检验在禁毒工作中的情报作用     

Western Political Research Approaches and the Development of Political Science Methodology in China

The restoration and development of political science as a discipline in China since 1980 benefits from its methodological improvements that were made largely by introducing research approaches from western academia. The aim of this paper is to examine the evolution of the introduction based on articles published in Chinese academic journals since 1990. There exists a wide diversity in research approaches in political science, and the authors try to explain why each approach has a different impact on Chinese political studies and how the introduction of such knowledge has changed the way Chinese political researchers understand the methodology and political science as a discipline.