530 Nature Vol. 288 II December 1980 lines, a small majonty for recording victims of this process was the Agricultural research research carried out under P2 containment Encyclopedia Moderna, a philosophy of conditions and above, and a larger science journal edited by Dr Supek himself. majority for keeping a record merely of all Dr Supek stresses that it is not the "self­ Ministry at top research in P3 and P4 containment management" process - Yugoslavia's An impending change in the relationship conditions, the two strictest categories. special contribution to socialism - which between the Agricultural Research Council Reflecting their general belief that is at fault. If the current trend towards and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries recombinant DNA research no longer bureaucratic centralism could be reversed, and Food (MAFF) now seems likely. Most represents a greater hazard than ordinary he said, and "self-management" restored probably, the council will in future be more research with microorganisms, many to scientists, both basic and applied directly subject to the ministry. In this committee members were sceptical about research would benefit. At present, respect, it is likely to be worse off than the the value of a broad study of the however, self-management is simply a Medical Research Council, which in effectiveness of IBCs which NIH is now slogan. October reached an arrangement with its preparing. Such official duplicity, said Dr Supek, is chief sponsoring department of If the committees had any value, it was nothing new in Yugoslav science. In 1956, government, the Department of Health felt, it had been in calming public fears when Yugoslavia began a nuclear research and Social Security, that some £12 million about the health implications of such programme, Dr Supek, as director of the of "Rothschild money" should be research. Mr Ray Thornton, for example, prestigious Rudjer Boskovic Physics transferred back to its own annual budget. recently appointed chairman of the Research Institute, found himself ex Change has been in the air since the advisory committee, said that the careful officio on the country's atomic energy publication of a report of the Public supervision of experiments had been commission. Although the programme Accounts Committee in July 1979 which largely responsible for the general develop­ had, officially, a purely scientific and suggested that the government should ment of public confidence. peaceful orientation, its members included consider transferring a further slice of the Other speakers suggested that, even if no the Minister of Defence Ivan Gosrjak and ARC budget to the agriculture ministry. extra hazards had been identified, the The underlying principle is that put public discussion raised by initial fears had forward in 1971 by Lord Rothschild, who helped to generate a consciousness about advocated giving control of research the need to watch for biohazards in budgets to the chief users of the results of general. David Dickson research - the ministerial "customers". At present, some 40 per cent of the research Yugoslavia now council's spending derives from the ministry, and the Public Accounts Committee was asking why the balance Supek's worry should not be shifted further. Yugoslavia could shortly face economic For the past year, a committee under the collapse if the planners fail to make proper chairmanship of Sir Brian Hayes, use of the country's scientific personnel. permanent secretary at the ministry, has This is the opinion of Dr Ivan Supek, the been trying to decide what should be done. Yugoslav physicist and philosopher, in The alternative to a further transfer of London this week for a Pugwash meeting. funds is a more direct influence by the Yugoslav scientific and academic life, Supek (right) and defence minister, 1956 ministry on the policy of the council. says Dr Supek, has almost completely lost Minister of Internal Affairs Alexander Although a decision has not yet been the impetus of 20 years ago. The financing Rankovic. Their presence made Dr Supek reached, the second course is the more of basic research is hampered by a extremely sceptical of the true aim of the likely. Either way, the council is unlikely to bureaucratic system which allegedly sub­ programme, and made him a fervent be overjoyed. ordinates research to consumer control. opponent not only of nuclear weapons but Like many government-supported But reliance on foreign licences (usually of all applications of nuclear energy. institutions, the council (ARC) has been purchased when already obsolescent) The duplicity, which, in Dr Supek's hard-pressed to operate within its cash means that the technological base required words, is allowing self-management to be limits during the financial year 1979-80. by Yugoslav industry and agriculture is killed in the name of self-management, will Nevertheless, by the end of that year, says either inappropriate or altogether absent. be a major obstacle to any move by the its annual report published last week, it had The chief factor in the decline, according scientists to regain their pre-1971 position. managed to plan a reasonable research to Dr Supek, is excessive party and state The recent ban of the proposed cultural programme for 1980 and beyond by con­ control over science. After the hardliners' and sociological journal Javnost was centrating its efforts on high priority coup of 1971, the universities lost much of justified by the Belgrade authorities on the research. their autonomy, including the right to elect grounds that the journal was meant to be a The council's choice of priorities was their own deputies to parliament. (Dr front for a would-be cultural elite. Dr effectively made by MAFF which has cut Dupek himself was a non-party deputy Supek, however, is strongly opposed to the amount of research it is prepared to buy from 1963 to 1967.) elitism, and would claim for science only in some of the ARC's research institutes At the same time, the university that right of self-government which is while increasing it in others. MAFF structure was decentralized. The constitutionally guaranteed to all Yugoslav currently pays for about half of the work University of Croatia, for example, was workers. The Party hardliners, however, conducted in ARC institutes under the divided into four separate universities are not prepared to yield without a Rothschild customer-contractor principle. (Zagreb, Split, Rijeka and Osijek) and the struggle. Recently agronomists working on MAFF is particularly keen to encourage individual faculties, rather than the the forthcoming five year plan proposed food research, interest which has proved university as a whole, became the basis of that, for modern farming methods to be lucky for the ARC's Meat Research planning and financing. Frequently, said introduced, the maximum peasant holding Institute whose grant of £370,000 from the Dr Supek, decision-making fell into the should be increased from 10 to 50 hectares. Meat and Livestock Commission was cut hands of party members with no particular But in spite of the deteriorating state of last September. MAFF has stepped in to academic background. Yugoslav agriculture, the proposal was make up some of the loss. It has also Under these arrangements, "censorship rejected as liable to cause class conflict. increased its contribution to the budget of by budget" was made easier. Among the Vera Rich the Food Research Institute in Norwich, 0028 -0836/ 80/ 5tXl530-0t $01.00 '{' 19HO Macmillan Journals Lid Nature Vol. 288 11 December 1980 531 the extra support going mainly to research the report argues for greater attention to but ions have been increasing, they have not on biopolymers, nutnt10n and basic science and the early introduction of kept up with inflation outside Israel - biotechnology. This new emphasis students to clinical work. Present dental except for the United Kingdom, whose coincides with a reorganization of the Food courses are too narrowly vocational, and donation has increased by two-thirds in the Research Institute and the setting up of a should be broadened but not lengthened past two years. This is due to the joint ARC-Medical Research Council (at present training lasts four or five years). encouragement of Lord Sieff, chairman of working party on food research policy. Instead, the argument goes, there should the major British chain store Marks and Irrespective of MAFF, ARC has been be a pre-registration year. Spencer, and also chairman of the increasing support for research in priority But where? Newly qualified physicians Weizmann Institute board of governors. areas, in particular by introducing a new spend their pre-registration years in The net result is that the Weizmann scheme for supporting work in universities hospitals, but dentists have no comparable budget will be static this year (October I 980 outside the normal research grant system. places of supervised work. The committee to September 1981) in dollar terms at about ARC research groups in photosynthesis suggests a system of supervision in practice $30 million, whereas institute officials have been set up at the universities of Leeds organized by the dental schools and based would have liked to see a small growth to and Sheffield and at Imperial College, on the Community Dent? I Service or on the take into account inflation abroad (where London; and at the University of Bristol a dental services provideo for the forces. It scientific equipment, for example, must group has been established in the also wants to sec a period of vocational mostly be bought). neurobiology of animal behaviour and training in the first two years of a dentist's Nevertheless, in I 980 funds were reproduction. The ARC's plans for the regular practice and more opportunities sufficient to establish, on a scientific staff forthcoming year include the for in-service training than there are at of 300, five new "career development establishment with the Medical Research present.