EVALUATION ACTIVITIES IN THE NORDIC COUNTRIES

There has been extensive experience with evaluations in the Nordic cou ntries. The paper gives a brief overview of work related to: evaluatio ns of research fields, bibliometric studies, evaluations of research p rogrammes, performance of research institutes, evaluation of bodies su pporting research, evaluation of universities, indicators and database s. Evaluations of whole areas of research started in the Nordic countr ies in the early 1980's. Another Nordic speciality is the evaluation o f research-funding bodies. These evaluations comprise the Swedish Coun cil for Planning and Co-ordination of Research: the Norwegian Research Council for Science and Humanities, the Academy of Finland and the Te chnology Development Centre (TEKES). Many research programmes, researc h institutes and more narrow research fields have been evaluated in th e Nordic countries. The evaluations have covered the tasks, performanc e and structure of these organisations. Lately, whole universities hav e been evaluated. A number of theoretical and methodological studies o n evaluation have been published. Indicators of scientific, technologi cal and educational performance and output have been developed in the Nordic countries. The paper deals mainly with ex post and to some exte nt also mid-term evaluations. However, ex ante evaluation, including p eer review, has actively been developed and applied in the Nordic coun tries, though these developments lie outside the scope of this paper. Typical for many Nordic evaluations is the use of foreign evaluators. Others have been based on surveys with potential users of research res ults and the scientists involved. Some of the evaluations have combine d these approaches. Bibliometric studies have been performed parallel with some of the evaluations. Other bibliometric studies have compared the performance of the Nordic countries in an international perspecti ve. In most cases the results of the evaluations are actively made pub lic. Many of the evaluations combine an assessment of quality and rele vance. According to Nordic experiences important conditions for useful evaluations are: credibility implying the use of impartial and recogn ised experts and professionally done surveys; careful timing; active p ublicising of evaluation results; transparency of evaluation procedure ; concrete measures and action following the evaluation. When possible data required for the evaluation should be collected already in conne ction with the application or the report of the projects.