Promoting the development of the academic path through the National System of Researchers : A first attempt at evaluation

Purpose – Mexico is an OECD member country that historically has allocated less than half a per cent of its gross domestic product to spend on research and experimental development. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the country’s science and technology policy through its main program, the National System of Researchers (SNI), an attempt made for the first time. The results obtained make it possible to see whether the SNI has succeeded in improving research in Mexico. The authors also look at whether the program provides ways of improving and strengthening the science policy model adopted by Mexico and whether it could be extended and/or introduced into other nearby countries with levels of development or characteristics similar to those of Mexico. Design/methodology/approach – After that, the authors will analyze the scientific productivity of SNI members in comparison to Mexican researchers as a whole so as to assess both whether the SNI selects the best researchers and whether these researchers carry out more research and of a higher quality. Finally, the authors will check whether the selection criteria of the assessment committees are internally consistent. To do this, the authors will carry out a bibliometric analysis of Mexican scientific production (overall and specifically of SNI members) and an analysis of the groups of researchers belonging to the SNI. Findings – The aim of this paper is to discover the impact and importance of the best program in Mexico as regards research policy, known as the SNI. Analyzing it will, in short, enable the authors to detect whether the program has been of use in improving the investigation potential and capacity for science and technology transfer of the research elite in Mexico; check whether the levels assigned to these researchers within the SNI are justified, based on research indicators (inputs and outputs); and assess the pros and cons of the SNI program with an eye to reviewing it in Mexico. Research limitations/implications – A limitation of using cross-sectional data is that information is not the same in each period analyzed. However, the SNI of Mexico has used the same information in all its evaluations. Therefore, the authors believe that using longitudinal data allows us to compare the evolution of SNI for various periods. This certainly is helpful for making decisions and, above all, provides first-hand information to the authorities who, in turn, should strengthen and make more efficient remedial measures regarding public policies on science and technology in Mexico. Practical implications – SNI assessment program will know the science and technology of Mexico and whether it is advisable to implement this program of science policy in similar economies or the same level of development as Mexico. Social implications – The contributions of this study are relevant to the extent that the evaluation system of researchers from Mexico is the basis for allocating research resources, making proposals to help improve the system for evaluating researchers and contributing to efficiency in the allocation of resources for research. Originality/value – This paper has also applied different techniques that have made it possible to look more thoroughly into the classification of all the researchers who were assessed positively by the SNI for period 1996-2003. These techniques have enabled us to obtain alternative classifications based on statistical algorithms and to gauge the level of internal consistency of the classifications made by the SNI, based strictly on the quantitative information supplied.