Long-run trends suggest a broad shift is taking place in the institutional financing structure that supports academic research. According to data compiled by the OECD reported in Figure 1, industry sources are financing a growing share of academic research while “core” public funding is generally shrinking. This ongoing shift from public to private sponsorship is a cause for concern because these sponsorship relationships are fundamentally different. Available evidence suggests that industry financing does not simply replace dwindling public money, but imposes additional restrictions on academic researchers. In particular, industry sponsors frequently limit disclosure of research findings, methods, or materials by delaying or banning public release.
Recent economic research highlights why public disclosure of academic research is important. Disclosure permits the stock of public knowledge to be cumulative, accessible, and reliable. It limits duplication of research efforts, allows new knowledge to be replicated and verified by professional peers, and permits access and use by other researchers which enhances opportunities for complementary research. Some work finds that greater access to ideas and materials in academic research not only increased incentives for direct follow-on research, but led to an increase in the diversity of research by increasing the number of experimental research lines. Other work, examining the theoretical conditions supporting “open science” versus “secrecy”, stressed that maintaining and growing the stock of public knowledge requires a limit on the private financial returns obtained through secrecy.
To better understand the potential implications of increased industry funding, we implemented a research project that examined the relationship between industry sponsorship and restrictions on publication disclosure using individual-level data on German academic researchers. Germany is an apt setting for examining this relationship. It has a strong tradition of public financial support for academic research and, according to the OECD, Germany experienced the most dramatic growth in its share of industry sponsorship, an 11.3 percentage point increase from 1995 to 2010 (see Figure 1).
German academic researchers were surveyed about the degree of publication disclosure restrictions experienced during research projects sponsored by government, foundations, industry, and other sources. To examine if industry sponsorship jeopardizes disclosure of academic research, we modeled the degree of restrictiveness (i.e. delay and secrecy) as a function of the researcher’s budget share financed by industry. This formulation allows us to examine two potential effects of industry sponsored research contracts. The first is an adoption effect that takes place when academic researchers commit to industry funding. The second is an intensity effect that captures how publication restrictions depend on the researcher’s exposure to greater ex post review and evaluation by industry sponsors. Our models include covariates that control for non-industry extramural sponsorship, personal characteristics, research characteristics, institutional affiliations, and scientific fields of study.
Both the descriptive and regression results show a positive relationship between the degree of publication restrictions and industry sponsorship. The percentage of respondents who reported higher secrecy (partial or full) is significantly larger for industry sponsored researchers than it is for researchers with other extramural sponsors, 41% and 7% respectively. Controlling for selection, adopting industry sponsorship more than doubles the expected probabilities of publication delay and secrecy. The intensity effect is positive and significant with a larger effect on publication secrecy than on publication delay when academic researchers become heavily supported by industrial firms. These results are robust to the possibility that researchers self-select into extramural sponsorship and to the possibility that the share of industry sponsorship is endogenous due to unobserved variables.
Based on our analysis, the shift from public to private sponsorship seen in the OECD aggregate data reflects changes in the microeconomic environment shaping incentives for disclosure by academic researchers. On average, academic researchers are willing to restrict disclosure in exchange for financial support by industry sponsors. Our results shed light on an important challenge facing policymakers. Understanding the trade-off between public and private sponsorship of academic research involves gauging the impact of disclosure restrictions on the quantity, quality, and evolution of academic research to better understand how these restrictions may ultimately influence innovation and economic growth.
Image credit: Computer research, © Jürgen François, via iStock Photo.
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By Eve E. Garrow
Does the government fund nonprofit human service organizations that serve and locate in the neighborhoods with the greatest needs? This is an important question, as much of the safety net now takes the form of human services delivered, for the most part, by nonprofit organizations. Access to government benefits therefore relies increasingly on the location of nonprofits that are awarded government funds to provide human services. While conventional wisdom holds that the partnership between government and the nonprofit sector does direct government benefits to poor areas, recent research finds an opposite effect in poor neighborhoods that are substantially African American.
The prevailing model of government-nonprofit relations argues that privatization of human services is a “win-win” partnership, because nonprofits need government support if they are to survive in resource-poor neighborhoods, and government fulfills its mandate to serve poor people by funding these organizations. Indeed, research shows heavy dependence on government funding among nonprofit human service organizations that serve poor populations and locate in poor neighborhoods.
Yet, this research does not take into consideration the influence of race on the distribution of government benefits. A recent study using data from a probability sample of nonprofit human service organizations in Los Angeles County examined the likelihood that organizations received government funding. It found that greater levels of neighborhood poverty improved the chances that nonprofit human services located in them received government funding — unless those neighborhoods were substantially African American.
As shown in the graph below, the analysis compared neighborhoods with small shares of African Americans to neighborhoods in which the share of African Americans exceeded 20 percent of all residents — the “tipping point” at which whites tend to view the neighborhood as being “too African American” and avoid it. In neighborhoods that are less than or equal to 20 percent African American, the likelihood that the organization will receive government support increases along with rising poverty, consistent with the partnership model of government-nonprofit relations. In neighborhoods that exceed 20 percent African American, however, the relationship between neighborhood poverty and government funding reverses. As neighborhood poverty increases, the likelihood that nonprofit human service organizations receive government funding decreases.
Interaction between percent living in poverty and percent African American residents in location
The analysis also examined the relationship between the poverty rate and receipt of government funding for organizations in census tracts with different percentages of Latina/os, another minority group in Los Angeles County that experiences high levels of poverty. As shown in the figure below, higher neighborhood poverty seems to encourage government to fund local nonprofit human services regardless of the percentage of Latina/os in the neighborhood.
Interaction between percent living in poverty and percent Latina/o residents in location
What accounts for the failure of the partnership model in poor African American neighborhoods? First, and consistent with research that demonstrates a pattern of systematic government disinvestment in programs for vulnerable minority populations, the findings suggest that the allocation of government funding to nonprofits is subject to discriminatory forces. It could be that policymakers and public officials are reluctant to channel funding to neighborhoods that are negatively constructed and widely viewed as undeserving of government largesse, and direct limited funding to neighborhoods that are viewed as more deserving. It could also be that supposedly “color-blind” grant and contract programs that rely on competition tend to shut out historically oppressed minority neighborhoods that lack competitive advantages.
Yet, this does not explain why government is relatively responsive to poor neighborhoods with a high percentage of Latina/os. After all, Latina/os, like African Americans, are subject to discrimination in the American stratification system. The difference may lie in the relative electoral power of blacks and Latina/os in Los Angeles County. Political representation should influence allocation decisions, because groups with political power cannot be ignored even if they are negatively constructed. In Los Angeles County, African Americans represent a small percentage of the electorate — about 8 percent in 2010 — and their numbers have been shrinking in recent decades. By comparison, the percentage of Latina/os in the county, which stood at about 48 percent in 2010, is relatively large and increasing. Given their diminished electoral clout, poor African American neighborhoods may be more disadvantaged than poor Latina/o neighborhoods when it comes to attracting government funds.
The findings are particularly disturbing given that African American are more likely than other minority groups to live in neighborhoods that are both poor and highly segregated from whites. Indeed, the racial dynamics uncovered in this study suggests that the privatized welfare state may underserve neighborhoods where the need is greatest.
Eve E. Garrow is Assistant Professor of Social Work at the University of Michigan. Her research focuses on the implications of privatization of human services for poor and marginalized groups, especially racial minorities, and the commercialization of human services. She has published and presented works on government funding of human services, the role of nonprofit advocacy in promoting social rights, and the risk of client exploitation in nonprofit social enterprises that use clients as labor. Her most recent article, “Does Race Matter in Government Funding of Nonprofit Human Service Organizations? The Interaction of Neighborhood Poverty and Race,” was published in the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory.
The Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory serves as a bridge between public administration and public management scholarship on the one hand and public policy studies on the other. Its multidisciplinary aim is to advance the organizational, administrative, and policy sciences as they apply to government and governance. The journal is committed to diverse and rigorous scholarship and serves as an outlet for the best conceptual and theory-based empirical work in the field.
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From Change.org:
About this petition
The Canada Council for the Arts supports the publication of most literary forms, including graphic novels, but not cartooning and cartoon books. It currently supports Canadian novelists and their novels, short fiction writers and their collections, poets and their poetry, essayists and their essays etc. Such work is eligible for funding both for the artist and for the publishers of the work, and it is also eligible for prizes such as the Governor General’s Literary Awards (which are administered by the Canada Council). Such work – a previously published poem, say – is eligible even when it has already appeared in magazines, newspapers and other publications.
Cartoonists are currently excluded from these grants and honours. Publishers interested in publishing the work of Canadian cartoonists cannot apply for funding to defray some of the costs of doing so. Should a publisher choose nonetheless to publish a book of cartoons, the book cannot even be considered in an assessment of the publisher’s eligibility for funding or block funding, nor are such books eligible for the Governor General’s Literary Awards. Graphic novelists are also excluded from these awards.
Given the artistic quality of Canadian cartooning, it’s cultural importance, its centrality to an understanding of Canadian society and history, and its appeal to readers of all ages, a strong argument can and should be made that the Canada Council should support the work of Cartoonists and that of publishers interested in publishing their work. The Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists is ideally positioned to lobby for such a change in Canada Council policy.
And we do know that ACEC members are good at getting their point across.
Terry Mosher (Aislin), OC
Past President
Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists
The petition letter:
Make cartoonists and their publishers eligible for grants and honours.
Greetings,
I just signed the following petition addressed to: The Canada Council for the Arts..
—————-
Make cartoonists and their publishers eligible for grants and honours.
The Canada Council for the Arts supports the publication of most literary forms, including graphic novels, but not cartooning and cartoon books. It currently supports Canadian novelists and their novels, short fiction writers and their collections, poets and their poetry, essayists and their essays etc. Such work is eligible for funding both for the artist and for the publishers of the work, and it is also eligible for prizes such as the Governor General’s Literary Awards (which are administered by the Canada Council). Such work – a previously published poem, say – is eligible even when it has already appeared in magazines, newspapers and other publications.
Cartoonists are currently excluded from these grants and honours. Publishers interested in publishing the work of Canadian cartoonists cannot apply for funding to defray some of the costs of doing so. Should a publisher choose nonetheless to publish a book of cartoons, the book cannot even be considered in an assessment of the publisher’s eligibility for funding or block funding, nor are such books eligible for the Governor Gen
Considering the Conservative Government has made large across the board cuts to arts funding in general, I pretty much guarantee they won’t give a damn about this petition.
If only my mother was still a Canadian citizen when I was born. :(
I agree Pablo, but the petition might put the issue on the NDP or Liberal radar, and Harper won’t be in power forever.
No matter is too little or too great that it can’t be used to take a shot at Harper’s government. Cartoonists weren’t eligible before his election either.
They should be, of course.
Canada’s border patrol has a nasty habit of arresting comic book readers, tossing them in jail and forcing them to cough up $75,000 in legal fees to defend themselves.
You’d think that would be more of a priority…