Braun Tibor, Schubert András (szerk.): Szakértői bírálat (peer review) a tudományos kutatásban : Válogatott tanulmányok a téma szakirodalmából (A MTAK Informatikai És Tudományelemzési Sorozata 7., 1993)
RUSTUM ROY: Alternatives to Review by Peers: A Contribution to the Theory of Scientific Choice
145 ROY: ALTERNATIVES TO REVIEW BY PEERS ported find it difficult even to consider alternative systems in an objective and open manner. For those entering research after 1950, the system of peer review has become synonymous with support for their own scientific research. Some regard any criticism as a threat to the continued support of their research —hence there has been no scientific inquiry into or discussion about alternative systems. The National Academy of Sciences which has often risen to the defence of the system of peer review has never considered the possible alternatives. The fact is that scientific research has been supported by an enormous variety of institutional arrangements all over the world; the system of peer review is only one of these. Alternatives do not need to be invented —they already exist in abundance. In most countries, the existing systems tend to make "block" grants to universities, laboratories or departments. In Great Britain, for example, the University Grants Committee provides grants to run over a number of years for universities; these include sums for the maintenance of departmental research activities such as costs of new equipment and salaries for research. Graduate students are supported again from block grants to departments, from the Science and Engineering Research Council. Finally, the latter body —and other ministries —also makes grants for special research projects on the basis of one-page general proposals. In Japan "laboratory-sized groups" under a senior professor, with some younger teachers and students, are supported for five- to ten-year periods, on the basis of site-visits and review, while students are supported directly by the Ministry of Education. In South Africa, an interesting variant of review by peers focuses exclusively on the most recent research by the individual professor, without requiring any proposal describing the research which the professor intends to carry out in the immediate future. In the United States itself much more money for research is actually distributed by the "strong-manager" system used by the Department of Defense and other agencies which support "mission-oriented" basic research than by the system of review by peers. In the academic world of the United States, a system for the support of research —review by peers — became firmly established as a result of the involvement of the major universities in military research during the Second World War: with the best of intentions, it turned out to favour those universities. In some disciplines — notably the applied sciences —scientists frequently receive part of the support for their research through the "strong-manager" system and part from agencies which depend on review by peers. Such persons are particularly well placed to compare the systems. Interestingly enough, the fields which are further removed from application, such as theoretical physics and chemistry, radio-astronomy, and many parts of the life sciences, have never experienced any system of support other than the peer reviews employed by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. Nevertheless, many leading scientists of the United States are
