Due t o the significant role of capital expenditures on scientific equipment and facilities a t higher education schools in the United States, it is interesting t o analyze their development.
Capital expenditures from federal sources for R&D a t higher education institutions in the United States declined steadily from 1972 t o 1986, re- covering thereafter. Nevertheless, in 1989 they had attained only the 1976 level (refer t o Table 4). This decline is sharply accentuated when inflation
184 R&D Conditions in Higher Education Institutions is taken into account. While support from non-federal sources did increase, the growth rate was insufficient t o compensate for the negative inflation- ary effect. Thus, in 1989, total capital expenditures were barely more than in 1980 (in constant dollars) and federal funding was down t o one-third of its 1972 level in constant dollars (U.S. Department of Commerce multiple editions).
The result of this decline in expenditure has been the growing obsoles- cence of research facilities and instrumentation in the United States higher education schools. T h e magnitude is achieved due t o the continuous increase (above inflation) in the cost of sophisticated instrumentation (generally in the range $100,000 t o $1 million range), and the relative decrease of funds available (at all levels-federal, state, local and university) t o purchase such equipment.
T h e cost of scientific equipment have increased four times since 1970 and a whole new range of technologies have become standard accoutrements in research laboratories over the past few years. One investigation found that the average age of university instruments was twice that of instrumentation a t quality industrial laboratories (Ibid). In addition, research equipment has been estimated t o have a lifetime as short as three t o eight years because advances in instrumentation due t o internal research projects. As a conse- quence, the Departments of Defense and Energy, leading R&D performers in the nation, have also increased instrumentation funding. Higher educa- tion schools have begun t o explore in-house methods of dealing with these issues, employing solutions such as creative debt financing, user charges, and limited partnerships.
T h e information about capital expenditures and current fund expendi- tures for research equipment a t higher education institutes in Russia does not exist. However, as noted earlier, the d a t a collected under the former Soviet higher education organization can be used as proxy in order t o rec- ognize the main tendencies in Russia, where the majority of the All-Union institutes were located.
There was constant growth in costs of equipment a t the higher edu- cation institutes in the former USSR between 1970-1986, yet the yearly expenditures for equipment did not increase and even slightly declined be- tween 1983-1984 (refer t o Table 5). Thus, the renewal of capital funds was very slow. Several authors have noted that the obsolescence of machines a t higher education institutions must t o be guided by material production. In the 1980's, the average annual increase of equipment in the Soviet national economy was about 5%; a t the higher education institutes the average an-
Nadezhda Makamva 185 nual increase of equipment was between 2% and 4%, indicating that the renewal of capital equipment was even slower here than elsewhere in the economy. Consequently, the majority of higher education institutes lacked state-of-the-art equipment for research. An exception was the S&E higher education institutes of double subordination (the average annual increase of equipment in these institutions was 5%), but, as a rule, that which was more rapidly replaced was of less sophistication.
In order to perform meaningful research and development accurately, efficiently and rapidly, electronic computer equipment is essential. Since 1985, the growth rates for the utilization of computers increased: in 1984, the higher education institutes subordinated t o the All-Union Ministry of Education received 80 computers and, in 1985, already 263. One year later, there were 7,028 computers employed by the All-Union Ministry of Educa- tion in its institutions: 54% of these computers were at higher education institutes in Russia. Nevertheless, a quantity as this was clearly insufficient for 293,816 instruction staff, 42,837 undergraduate and 2,983,081 total stu- dents enrolled. According to the report for 1985, more than 70% of 6,765 computers were older and near obsolete models (CSAER of the USSR, 1986).
Information about contemporary computer security in Russian institu- tions of higher learning is absent. The situation now is consistently improv- ing, mainly due to the use of different forms of funding instruments including contracts and cooperative agreements. In fact, the cooperation is such that the computers and other equipment, which are the property of the maloe predprejatie, are usually used for R&D a t higher education institutes.
Thus, the integration between higher education institutions, scientific organizations, and industry is of growing importance for today's Russia.
Indeed, the primary motive is the joint exploitation of instrumentation and facilities, especially the newest and most expensive equipment.
Integration of Academia, Industry, and Science
There are different objectives behind an integration of higher education in- stitutes, industry, and scientific organizations in the United States and in Russia. The main purposes of this integration in the United States is t o im- prove their own and the nation's competitive positions, prevent stagnation, and discover new markets. The key t o such achievements is t o mobilize all scientific and technological resources, including higher education institutions which still possess untapped reserves, whose contribution can be increased
186 R&D Conditions in Higher Education Institutions by adopting appropriate policies. Indeed, universities in the United States contribute to the structural revitalization of the national economy by as- sisting small and medium enterprises as well as by generating entirely new high-technology businesses.
In recent years, considerable attention has focused on university-industry research cooperation in the United States. Industrial firms have sought ways t o augment their basic research portfolios and their innovative capabilities and higher education institutes have explored new sources of research fund- ing. A variety of cooperative R&D arrangements, particularly in emerging areas such as biotechnology, have increased the importance of university re- search (primarily long-range basic research which industry is reluctant to support in its own laboratories) t o meeting industrial needs, as well as in- dustry's broader need t o keep track of current developments in all fields of S&E (facilitated by contacts with university researchers) in order t o remain a t the forefront of technological competitiveness.
While industrial funding is not expected t o be a substitute for federal support of university research, the growing relationships are widely regarded as significant and mutually beneficial. Many universities have actively sought the enhancement of existing relationships and the establishment of new ones, while industrial firms have begun competing with one another to develop connections t o the top universities, and the federal government has set up programs and otherwise sought to encourage the trend. The new arrange- ments have raised new questions concerning federal and institutional poli- cies relating to academic freedom, protection of intellectual property (such as patents and copyrights), anti-trust regulations and technology transfer (refer t o R. Stankiewicz's recent work (1985) for more details).
In Russia, one of the main purposes for the aforementioned integration was a direct external economic lever t o improve the recruitment and training of students and the method in which they are employed after graduation.
Integration can lead t o mutual economic dependence between higher educa- tion institutes on the one hand and the research institutes (both academic and industrial) on the other. But, it is necessary to note that the most pro- found current incentive for integration and mobilization of all scientific and technological resources is t o secure the survival of science in Russia during the transitionary period and thereafter.
Unfortunately, the post-Soviet scientific community has been and con- tinues t o be plagued by a low level of interaction between higher education institutes and industry as a result of the lack of crucial links between sci- ence, technology and production over decades of communist rule. Additional