Institutions
See also: Category:Research institutes in ChinaThe State Council of the People's Republic of China is the top administrative organ in China. Immediately below it are several ministries and ministry level organisations involved with various aspects of science and technology. The State Council Science and Education Leading Group, consisting of the leaders of the major science bodies, attempts to organize the national policy. Efficiency of overall coordination has been questioned with various agencies seen as having overlapping missions and rivalries for resources and sometimes engaging in wasteful duplication.
The Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China, formerly the State Science and Technology Commission, is the body primarily responsible for science and technology strategy and policy. It also administers national research programs, S&T development zones, and international cooperation. The Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China oversees education as well as research institutes at universities. Several other ministries such as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the People's Republic of China, the Ministry of Health of the People's Republic of China, and the Ministry of Agriculture of the People's Republic of China are also involved in S&T.
The National Planning Office of Philosophy and Social Sciences directs planning for social sciences and philosophy.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) is the most prestigious professional science organisation in China with China's scientific elite being members. It directs many research institutes, research programs, graduate training programs, and gives influential advice. The Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE) gives important advice but unlike the CAS does not have research institutes of its own. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) has a similar role to CAS for social sciences and philosophy. There are also many more narrow academies such as the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences.
The National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) gives grants to individual researchers after peer-review.
The People's Liberation Army General Armaments Department directs military R&D.
The national scientific and academic organizations affiliated to the China Association for Science and Technology are also important forces in scientific and technological research.
Research is carried out by governmental research institutes, in higher learning institutions, and by private enterprises.
Local governments have become increasingly important in R&D funding and may now contribute up to half of government spending. Intense rivalry for research and high-tech industry has been argued to sometimes create wasteful subsidized overcapacity, dispersal of efforts better centralized in a few localities, and poorly judged bureaucratic subsidizing of technologies that soon become out-dated.
Read more about this topic: Science And Technology In The People's Republic Of China
Famous quotes containing the word institutions:
“Understanding the spirit of our institutions to aim at the elevation of man, I am opposed to whatever tends to degrade them.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival.”
—Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)
“We as a nation need to be reeducated about the necessary and sufficient conditions for making human beings human. We need to be reeducated not as parents—but as workers, neighbors, and friends; and as members of the organizations, committees, boards—and, especially, the informal networks that control our social institutions and thereby determine the conditions of life for our families and their children.”
—Urie Bronfenbrenner (b. 1917)