PRIORITY-SETTING AND ECONOMIC PAYOFFS IN BASIC RESEARCH - AN AMERICANPERSPECTIVE

During the past several years, budgetary problems and increased attent ion to the problem of improving US economic competitiveness have led t o pressure to change the system through which priorities for federal f unding of basic research are set. A number of reports and policy state ments have challenged the long-accepted practice of allowing prioritie s among disciplines and board areas of research to be set in a decentr alised manner in which political factors predominate and groups of sci entists in different fields advocate their interests more or less inde pendently of one another. The challenge to policymakers and the scient ific community is to learn how to allocate resources in a manner that improves economic performance without restricting the freedom of indiv idual scientists to set their own research directions. This paper revi ews the central elements of the debate over priority-setting and the c ontribution of basic research to economic competitiveness in the Unite d States, discusses lessons that have been learned, and considers how the issues might eventually be resolved.