The ongoing damage to Greek scientific research is not solely due to austerity measures (Nature 517, 127–128; 2015). In my experience as a member of Greece's National Council for Research and Technology from 2010 to 2014, political manipulation and institutional weakness are also contributors.

To address the dire problem of underfunded research, in 2011 the council introduced an open, competitive grant scheme (called Aristeia, or excellence) based on the European Research Council model. It ran for two rounds, during which we had to battle against other governmental forces to maintain its European Union (EU) funding. The scheme now seems to have been abandoned.

The council developed a multi-annual plan that year for research and development (R&D) to bring Greece closer to EU expenditure targets by 2020. This was stalled and diverted by government. We pressed for the creation of a high-level government committee to oversee R&D, and for a research agency similar to the US National Science Foundation. That plan was also lost, diluted by the research law you mention.

The council's experience reflects the wider problems of Greece's government: how it seeks and receives expert advice, the public status of this process and the near-impossibility of rational, stable long-term planning. The shallow and short-term strictures of the 'troika' — the three organizations that act for Greece's creditors — make matters worse.