APPENDIX 4
Memorandum from the Political Studies
Association
RELATIONSHIPS WITH
THE ESRC
We would like to commend the ESRC for the attention
it has given under its current leadership to developing relations
with professional associations. The steps taken have included
meetings with our officers, participation in sessions at our annual
and heads of department conferences and contributions to our newsletter
for members. In particular, we consider that there has been extensive
consultation about the ESRC's new strategic framework and priorities
for 2004-05. We hope that this pattern of consultation with the
various associations representing the different disciplines in
social science continues. Each discipline has its own particular
profile and potential contribution to ESRC activities and consultation
should continue at the disciplinary level rather than being focused
on bodies claiming to represent the social sciences as a whole.
FUNDING FOR
RESEARCH
It is important that the ESRC continues to provide
funding that is accessible to new or recent entrants to social
science. Postdoctoral fellowships are important in this respect.
Response mode funding is also more readily accessible to younger
staff. There needs to be continual and rigorous scrutiny of the
value for money offered by research centres compared to other
forms of funding. There is a danger that they may reinforce a
fashionable orthodoxy rather than stimulating new and innovative
thinking. Some of the best value for money can be obtained from
fellowships for individual academics as they enable people to
have thinking time which is often at a premium in modern universities.
COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY
We are aware that ESRC puts considerable effort
into its communications strategy, to encouraging grant holders
to develop their own strategies in conjunction with the ESRC and
in ensuring that grant holders have the skills required for effective
communication through the mass media. The outcome is, however,
sometimes a little disappointing. Specialist stakeholder audiences
are often reached, but more general public awareness of the ESRC's
work is not well developed.
ESRC QUOTA AWARDS
The PSA has strong reservations regarding the
ESRC's decision to move to quota awards for PhD studentships.
In recent years, the ESRC has stipulated that recognition for
awards was contingent upon the provision of rigorous research
training. We have supported this move and it has led to large
numbers of Politics departments reviewing and improving their
postgraduate research training. It therefore seems illogical to
now restrict the number of studentships to a select number of
Departments. In short, Departments who have gained ESRC recognition
for the excellence of their research training, but who are not
eligible for quota awards, have no incentive to continue to provide
intensive research training along the lines that the ESRC previously
stipulated. The net effect is likely, therefore, to mean that
the provision of research training overall will decline in quality
and scope—something that is clearly counter-productive.
From the point of view of prospective research
students, the move is also potentially damaging. The Departments
that will receive quota awards are all fine ones (though it should
be noted that not all are rated at 5 or above). Nevertheless,
they do not cover all the areas of the discipline equally well.
Students who wish to study a sub-field in which none of the quota
Departments have any particular expertise, face a stark choice
between funded research with non-specialists, or self-funded research
with a more appropriate supervisor.
In sum, the ESRC competition for studentships
has worked well, alongside the ESRC-led improvements in research
training. We see little case for changing this approach and therefore
have strong reservations about the recent changes.
4 October 2004
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