Fueling Discovery or Monitoring Productivity: Research Scientists' Changing Perceptions of Management

Abstract

Public sector research institutes are finding themselves in an increasingly competitive, market-driven environment. This study seeks to examine the ways in which scientists make sense of this increasingly `managerial' orientation, and howitis reconciled (or not) with their notions of science and their professional interests and aspirations. A central theme emerging from interviews with scientists was that of increasing management control, and a perception that, whereas previously their work had been driven by scientific interests, such interests were now being circumscribed by the needs and demands of management. This study shows the ways in which individuals, while recognizing the constraints imposed upon them by their structural circumstances, negotiate with these structures in the pursuit of their own personal and professional interests. The article concludes that the relationship between the (polysemic) discourses of science and management must be seen as a dynamic and complex interplay.