Discussion meeting on WOTRO's new strategy

20 oktober 2005

The political millennium development goals must not directly determine WOTRO's research agenda. But they can serve as a source of inspiration. That is what senior researchers said during a consultation afternoon about WOTRO's new strategy held on Tuesday 20 September 2005 in the Jaarbeurs Conference Centre in Utrecht.

WOTRO's board is currently deliberating a new strategy for the period 2007-2010. What the board eventually puts to paper must convince NWO and DGIS to fund WOTRO for the coming years. The new strategy is therefore important, and the board wished to find out what the scientists it funds think about it.
Researchers had already been given a chance to respond to a first draft on the Internet. A total of 42 responses were received about the strategic memorandum; 28 via the WOTRO website and 14 by letter. During the consultation afternoon, the thirty researchers present (mainly social scientists) again discussed their viewpoints in small groups, and presented their findings at the end of the day.
The responses were diverse and not always positive. The criticism mainly concerned the millennium development goals, which had been proposed as a possible framework for WOTRO research. A number of researchers stated that this framework was too narrow and unstable. The millennium goals would exclude certain resear ch subject s and would be subject to political whims. “We are talking about 'the current political fashion'", said one of the researchers. “What is high on the political agenda one day, can be forgotten the next. Should we allow such issues to determine our research agenda?”
The majority felt not. But as another scientist present stated, these goals can serve as a source of inspiration. “The millennium development goals elicit many questions which we can try to answer. In particular there is a tension between the goals, which is ripe for research. For example, how do you want to combat poverty by means of facilitating agriculture, whilst also wanting to do something for the environment by means of afforestation?”
Further the scientists agreed that WOTRO should continue to fund a wide range of multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research that is relevant for the further development of Southern societies.
The chair of the WOTRO board, Martin Kropff promised to present the criticism at the ne xt managerial strategy meeting. He warned, however, that WOTRO had to make choices and that it could not 'establish a hundred research themes’. Further he commented that the millennium goals did not have to be seen as a strict framework. “They can also act as a research subject, instead of a research framework.”
The new strategy must have been committed to paper by the start of 2006.