Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences

Rigour and relevance

Extending the role of the social sciences and humanities in public policy research

Dr John H Howard

April 2008

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Executive summary

Australia needs to encourage a new form of research that contributes directly to the formulation of policy in government. Such research is initiated by the end user rather than the researcher. It is characterised by being strategically driven, problem oriented and cross-disciplinary.

It is becoming increasingly necessary to draw on knowledge from many disciplines in meeting the challenges and opportunities of the modern economy and society. Scientific or technological research, in particular, benefits from the inclusion of complementary work in the social sciences and humanities. We need to think about ways the practice of interdisciplinary research can be encouraged and facilitated.

Interdisciplinary research is likely to be driven by end-user requirements. The creation of new knowledge to address those requirements rarely falls within the ambit of a single discipline: new knowledge for policy application in such areas as the natural environment, health and society, energy, transport, communication or innovation is inherently interdisciplinary.

Interdisciplinary research presents a major challenge for researchers and research organisations. It requires disciplinary knowledge, built up through a rigorous commitment to research excellence, as well as a sound understanding of the way knowledge will be applied, gained through exposure to practice. Interdisciplinary research needs to be both excellent in its content and relevant to end-user needs and expectations.

Interdisciplinary research also requires supportive infrastructure and management of a type not easily accommodated in university settings. This paper looks the sort of arrangements that can accommodate the demands for rigour (excellence) and relevance (application and use) in research performance. It points to the need for effective collaborative arrangements within research organisations, as well as between research organisations and government end users.

The need for interdisciplinary approaches is becoming more pressing, as policymakers look for evidence as a basis for new program interventions and to make sure that scarce resources are directed towards resolving real, identified problems and delivering intended outcomes. In the area of climate change, water policy and the natural environment generally, policymakers and their advisers are calling for evidence drawn from research as a basis for policy and program design.

As the Australian Government moves to a new focus on innovation, the time is opportune to address ways in which government can support and fund problem-oriented, interdisciplinary research. The government has already signalled its determination to improve collaboration within the research community and between the public and private sectors, and has announced its intention of reviewing the system for allocating research funds.

The increasingly strategic approach to Australian public policy in the security, economic, social, cultural and environmental domains implies a need for research that contributes directly to policy formulation and implementation in those areas.

Policy research tends to be initiated by the end user (typically, government departments), rather than by the researcher. It is characterised by being strategically driven, problem-oriented and cross-disciplinary. As such, it necessarily based on what Ernest Boyer referred to as the 'scholarship of integration'. It differs from the other forms of scholarship (discovery, application and teaching), which have a strong disciplinary orientation.

Breakthroughs in research and development tend to occur at the intersection of disciplines and where there is an identified problem to be solved or an opportunity to address an unmet end-user want. Many discoveries lie dormant until an application is found, quite often in an area unforeseen or unimagined by the researcher or inventor. This is not an argument against 'basic' research: such breakthroughs rely on a solid foundation of curiosity-driven basic research that has as its purpose the extension of the frontiers of knowledge in a particular discipline.

Disciplinary research is rigorous, involving an ongoing quest for fundamental understanding and pushing the boundaries of knowledge. However, it is often of little direct relevance to policy issues and problems. Relevance requires both the rigour of disciplinary research and the insights that come from multiple perspectives on economic, social and environmental issues derived from a range of disciplines - within and between the physical, natural and life sciences, the socio-economic sciences and the humanities (Metcalf et al 2006).

Discussion and debate about research policy in recent years has had a very strong industry policy flavour, with a particular focus on industrial innovation. There has been very little discussion of research policy in the broader public policy domain and the contribution that research can make to improved policy outcomes and impacts. In the light of the current water crisis, for example, it is clear that water research has been substantially underfunded over the past 10 years.

From another perspective, there has been a tendency to regard research undertaken in or for the public sector as 'public good' or 'public benefit' research, implying a commitment to curiosity, discovery and research excellence and limited concern with application and adoption. That view is not sound, as public good research has both basic and applied dimensions. That is, public benefit research can be both excellent and relevant to policy formulation (as evidence), and can find its way into implementation through policy and program applications.

In general terms, however, applicable, policy-relevant, problem-oriented and strategically driven research (whether undertaken in universities, in other public research organisations or within the government sector) is not well funded - particularly when it crosses disciplinary boundaries. Capacity for policy research within government was substantially curtailed from 1996, with the abolition of a number of research bureaus and specialist policy research divisions. Public programs have since been implemented without the benefit of knowledge generated through research, with the result that resources have been wasted or results have failed to meet expectations.

More recently, government ministers, policymakers and departments have been saying that they want to take action on evidence. They want to explore opportunities and resolve problems on the basis of breakthroughs in science, technology and design, and they want to draw on the knowledge created through research in the humanities, arts and social sciences to understand the economic, social, environmental and cultural impacts of actions (or inaction), and of the process of adoption and implementation. Only through this broad-based approach is it possible and feasible to develop options and actions that address national problems and produce national benefits.

The solution proposed in this paper is a greater commitment to interdisciplinary research that works at the boundaries of disciplines through a scholarship of integration. Such an approach seeks to integrate research into a larger body of concepts and ideas, to interpret and draw it together in a way that addresses problems - and opportunities. The scholarship of integration is the ability to synthesise knowledge from disparate disciplines to resolve pressing problems. Policy issues in the natural environment, health and society, energy, transport, communication, emerging industries and innovation are likely to respond best to this approach.

This paper proposes a series of changes to enable integrative research in the public policy arena:

• establish a research plan in each government portfolio to address critical policy problems and issues, funded as a required element of overall portfolio budgets
• reorient of the Cooperative Research Centres Program to enable CRCs to address fundamental questions that affect public policy and industry performance
• extend the rural research and development corporation model to other industry sectors
• reconfigure the research and teaching agenda in universities, so that administrative units, reward structures and funding systems encourage rather than inhibit interdisciplinary work.

Integrative research will not replace discovery research, but complement it. By encouraging the research community to apply its skills to pressing problems facing Australia in the most direct and immediate way, it will open a new career path for researchers and maximise the return on Australia's investment in research.

 

John H Howard
18 May 2008

 

For more information, please contact:

Toss Gascoigne

Executive Director

Council of the Humanties, Arts and Social Sciences

Phone: +61 2 6249 1995

director@chass.org.au