On 14th and 15th November 2013 the international evaluation conference "New Horizons / New Challenges: evaluation of STI policies, instruments and organisations” was organised in Vienna, Austria. It provided an open forum for evaluators, scientists, research managers, authorities and STI policy makers to debate challenging developments in STI policy and their effects on evaluation theory and practice.
Eminent experts already agreed to engage at the conference’s sessions and dedicated panels, such as Irwin Feller (em. Penn State Univ.), Stefan Kuhlmann (Univ. Twente), Gretchen Jordan (Innovation LLC), Christina Schuh (Humboldt Foundation), Göran Marklund (Vinnova), Jordi Molas Gallart (CSIC - Spanish National Research Council), Sybille Hinze (ifq-Institute for Research Information and Quality Assurance), Jakob Edler (Univ. of Manchester), Philippe Laredo (L’IFRIS) and many more!
The next generation of STI policy evaluation designs and approaches is challenged by different developments such as the emergence of new demand-side oriented instruments, increasing complexity of appraisals, the demand for impact assessments by taking also non-economic effects into account, an amalgamation between national and European/international interventions in STI or the emphasis on new mission-oriented approaches (“grand challenges”), just to name a few.
The conference addressed these challenges in six dedicated thematic sessions:
- Frameworks and approaches for evaluating new STI policies and instruments
- The challenge of evaluating STI policy portfolios
- Evaluation of mission-orientated R&D
- Assessing the variety and long-term impact of research
- Challenges in assessing new European Research Area policies, programmes and instruments
- Information systems and STI indicators
The conference was organised by Austrian Platform Research and Technology Policy Evaluation (fteval), the Manchester Institute of Innovation Research (MIOIR) and L'IFRIS - institut Francilien Recherche Innovation Société. The conference language was English.
FWF, the Austrian Science Fund, provided a grant to this conference, which was used to support the participation of young researchers. For further information please refer to the websites: http://wbc-inco.net/object/event/12093 and http://sticon2013.fteval.at.
