Sweden blows cool on
conference preparations
27 May 1999
[LONDON] Unesco is being prompted by Sweden's national commission to play a more pro-active role in the World Conference on Science (WCS) by putting its weight behind calls for full public access to knowledge. The commission would also like to see social scientists play a greater role in Budapest than is currently planned.
Public access to knowledge, women in science, and investment in third world universities have emerged as the three priority areas for Sweden's delegation to next month's conference. Swedish delegates are expected to press Unesco to end its position of neutrality and "take a stand" by supporting the interests of the developing world.
Most of Unesco's member countries are in the developing world, says Anders Falk, general secretary of the national commission. "Unesco should support them," he adds. For example, he says, "they need access to knowledge. Without this, they will never be able to develop." Unesco, says Falk, should oppose what he calls the "increasing privatization of knowledge".
Sweden has been at the forefront of developed countries in demanding that investment in basic research and higher education should be considered integral to the process of development. Sweden has one of the largest overseas research budgets, concentrating its aid on research activities in east and southern Africa.
The country's strategy for the Budapest conference has been agreed after three preparatory meetings, the last of which took place last week at Uppsala. The WCS has generated considerable controversy, says Falk. Many delegates attending the preparatory meetings have voiced considerable criticism both of the conference programme, as well as draft versions of the two final documents - the World Declaration and the Framework for Action - which the conference will be asked to adapt, and which are described by one Swedish scientist as "toothless".
Another senior scientist says that he will not be attending the Budapest meeting because he is not convinced that his time there would be usefully spent. "I am hesitating in saying this because I know that many people in developing countries have put a lot of effort in preparing for this conference, and rate Unesco very highly. But there will be too many people [at the WCS], and there will be too much talk. I will be better off staying away."
Falk says that few will disagree with the aims and objectives of the draft declaration. "But we don't know who will be responsible for implementing the recommendations," he says. The agenda for action, according to Falk, should have clear lines of responsibility.
Falk is also concerned adds that the conference programme could become dominated by natural scientists, even though Unesco had been presented with a rare opportunity to put together a "forward-looking" programme by bringing together natural scientists with social scientists as well as academics from the liberal arts. "We are very dissatisfied," he says. "We [have] tried editing [the declaration]. It's not good enough [as it stands]."
Much of the discussion at the Uppsala meeting focused on two key -- and related -- issues: finding ways of developing research capacity within developing countries and stemming the brain drain to industrialized countries.
Malur Bhagavan of the department for research cooperation at the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), said that SIDA chooses to do this by helping to boost research within universities in developing countries -- both by helping to build up research departments, as well as creating a reservoir of potential researchers through the support of masters degree programmes. Local knowledge creation, he added, is key to the process of development.
A third element to the SIDA strategy, said Bhagavan, lies in the design of what he called "sandwich" PhD programmes. Under these programmes, students from developing countries spend only part of their time in Sweden researching a subject, which is of relevance to their country, and supervised jointly by professors at home, as well as in Sweden.
The agency had realized, said Bhagavan, that brain drain was a serious obstacle to local knowledge creation. And that inviting students from developing countries to study PhDs in the developed world accelerated brain drain because "a lack of resources [in their home countries] makes it unfeasible for students to return".
Some delegates pointed out that a sandwich PhD was still no insurance against brain drain. One speaker, Yadon Kohi, director general of Tanzania's research council, Costech, a major recipient of SIDA assistance, said that in the past Tanzania had lost many of its postgraduates to other countries. "They moved to neighbouring countries such as Botswana and Zimbabwe since the rewards were larger."
But Lennart Hasselgren of the University of Uppsala who coordinates Sweden's development activities in East Africa, said that that most SIDA-supported PhD students had not strayed far from their countries of origin. "Ninety-five per cent are working in a developing country." This, he added, was better for the developing world than losing some of their best minds to developed countries.
EHSAN MASOOD
Click here for further details of preparatory meetings held in Sweden.
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Nature © Macmillan Publishers Ltd 1999 Registered No. 785998 England.