Translated material
Bureaucratic revolution
The Ministry of Education and Science has published a draft document that can radically change the approach to financing scientific institutions.
On April 14, 2015, a draft department of departmental order of the Ministry of Education and Science “On the approval of methodological recommendations for the distribution of subsidies provided by federal state institutions in the field of scientific (research and research) and scientific and technical activity” was published on a specialized portal for the publication of projects of various regulatory acts [1] . Despite the boring name and the fact that the order is called departmental, it is directly related to all state scientific organizations and promises a cardinal change in the principles of their financing. We can say that on the approach of the actual reform of academic science in the vein in which the leadership of the Ministry of Education and Science sees it.
In the kingdom of bureaucratic illusions
Before talking about the proposed innovations, it is worth briefly reminded of how budgetary organizations engaged in scientific research are now financed. Like budget organizations in other areas of activity, the founders - the Federal Agency for Scientific Organizations (Fano), the Ministry of Education and Science, etc. - allocate funds (“subsidies”) to the implementation of the state assignment to scientific institutions. For scientific institutions, such a task is to conduct research on a given topics (“planned topics”). In the kingdom of bureaucratic illusions of the allocated funds, it should be enough to ensure the scientific work of the institution on planned topics. At the same time, formally, the legislation gives the organization of the organization freedom in determining what forces the work will be carried out: neither the staffing or the size of the official salaries will not be set on top, and the administration has the right to decide how many employees will work at the institute and what kind of official salaries to establish them.
In the reality in which researchers live, everything is different. It is clear that the size of the subsidy was actually determined taking into account the once (for the Institutes of the “Big Academy” - during the implementation of the pilot project to establish the industry system of remuneration) the established staff of the institute and the established sizes of the official salaries of researchers, taking into account the indexation. The organization receives money for the payment of officials to researchers, engineering and technical workers, administrative and managerial personnel for various additional payments provided for by law, as well as for a relatively small prize fund; The organization also receives something to ensure its current existence. The former academic institutes “salary” leaves the lion's share of subsidies. Obviously, this is completely not enough to ensure the normal scientific work of the institute even on planned topics.
Officials of a minobra, who is responsible for the regulatory framework in the field of science and education, understand the fabulousness of the bureaucratic picture of financing institutions within the framework of state assignment. But instead of trying to somehow bring reality and regulatory framework closer, they want to draw an even more beautiful and progressive fairy tale, designed to show how the efficiency of budgetary funds for scientific research will grow.
We have been born to make a fairy tale a past?
The word “effectiveness” implies that it is necessary to get away from planning from what has been achieved, oriented on old topics, etc. The Ministry of Education and Science suggests that the de facto survived “basic financing” will be replaced by the distribution of funds according to the competition, which is indicated by paragraph 3 of the methodological recommendations:
“ The state task in the field of science in accordance with the methodological recommendations is formed on a competitive basis and is directed:
a) to solve the institutions of scientific (scientific and technical) problems that are significant for the development of the state and society, defined by state programs of the Russian Federation, through the implementation of scientific (scientific, technical) civil projects:
- on topics established by the founder (hereinafter referred to as directive topics);
- on topics proposed by institutions (hereinafter referred to as initiative topics);
b) on the development of scientific (scientific and technical) potential and increasing the effectiveness of institutions through targeted support of scientists who have reached high scientific (scientific, technical) results (hereinafter referred to as leading researchers);
c) to ensure the functioning of the scientific and (or) scientific and technical infrastructure of institutions, including targeted support for collective use of scientific equipment, unique scientific
installations, including ensuring the activities of highly qualified scientific and technical workers, providing consumables, information resources (hereinafter-scientific infrastructure) . ”
The Ministry of Education and Science stipulates that "the volume of financial support of leading researchers should be at least 15% of the total subsidy, and scientific (scientific and technical) projects on initiative topics-at least 60%." According to the ministry, the projects supported by state assignment should ensure the actual science research: the estimates of the projects provide for the costs of labor, business trips, purchase of goods and services, the maintenance and operation of collective use centers, as well as general business needs. For leading researchers, a similar structure of expenses of expenses is generally provided, while the recommended amount of remuneration of the leading scientist is not lower than the four -fold average wage in the region. In the text of the project of methodological recommendations, nothing is said about the remuneration of administrative and managerial personnel, perhaps part of the subsidy of the organization that is not related to the implementation of state election will be allocated for these purposes.
The scheme of introduction of a new procedure for the formation of state assignment is as follows. First, the founders, for example, Fano, taking into account the developed methodological recommendations, in agreement with the Ministry of Education and Science, develop and approve a document called “The Procedure for the Formation of the State Task in the Sphere of Scientific (Research) Activities”. Then a competitive selection of leading researchers is carried out, and after it - contests of initiative projects of structural scientific units (standard provisions on competitions are given in applications to the document). Competitions on initiative topics are divided into competitions and competitions held by the founder held within the organization.
The amount of funds sent to organizations to conduct internal competitions depends, roughly speaking, on the success of their work, that is, on the results of monitoring the effectiveness of scientific organizations. Those organizations that, according to the results of the assessment will be classified as “lost development prospects”, will not give money to conduct internal competitions. Funds for ensuring the functioning of the scientific infrastructure will be proportional to the amount of funds allocated to the organization for internal competitions.
Finally, the founder has the right to direct the organization of some topics of the work if they are aimed at obtaining the results necessary to solve socio-economic problems, or involve the implementation of “research and development on the subjects of complex interagency and (or) interdisciplinary projects”.
Initial conditions ...
Now we will go down from bureaucratic heaven to earth and try to imagine what such a transformation of state assignment will result in scientific organizations in existing conditions, taking as an example their widespread type - former academic institutions that are now subordinate to Fano. Indeed, it would be strange to ignore such an important (and the most productive, if we talk about civil science) the civil science sector.
The work that began only last year Fano got an extremely diverse inheritance of the three state academies of sciences. Large institutes of the former RAS and experimental STSN stations, medical centers with clinical units and kindergartens, scientists' houses and scientific fleet. In the United Academies, the specifics of the work and systems of wages were significantly different. Fano is still trying to somehow systematize this inheritance, to integrate it into the management system, typical for most ministries and departments, with reporting on road maps, indicators and indicators, etc., etc. The institutes are chopping a shaft of papers that has already become familiar to universities, the level of bureaucratization is growing.
From this year, an updated system for evaluating the effectiveness of scientific institutions with division into reference groups and ranking within the group according to the level of success of work should begin to work. At the same time, an independent intrigue develops with the restructuring of the system of scientific institutions, providing for both possible mergers of organizations or the formation of a kind of consortium and grouping of institutions in the profile of activity. Bureaucratic logic, of course, delights: the assessment will pass simultaneously with restructuring.
Finally, a cutting of the federal budget expenditures was carried out last year, which, of course, also affected scientific research, both in terms of state assignment and in terms of competitive financing through scientific funds, FCP, etc. The next two to three years also do not promise any noticeable growth in financing of science.
Thus, without changing the state-owned format for the implementation of scientific research, financing of science is reduced, the bureaucratic burden on scientists is growing and there is no clarity, which and how will happen even in the two-three-year perspective. In general, all the conditions have been created to “increase” the productivity of science and attract young people thinking about tomorrow.
Counted - smiled
So, the radical reformatting of state assignment will take place in conditions when institutes will receive less money for state assignment than last year. At the same time, if we proceed from the project of methodological recommendations, the share of the salary component should noticeably fall in the former academic institutions subordinate to Fano - supported projects of structural units should, as mentioned above, ensure the possibility of scientific work, and some of the money will also go to ensure the functioning of the scientific infrastructure.
We will try to at least roughly evaluate what the reformatting of state assignment will result in. In Appendix 1 to the methodological recommendations, regulatory costs are set for the remuneration of scientific and scientific and technical workers for various professional qualification groups. The principle is the establishment of raising coefficients applied to the average wage in the region and average wages in Russia, i.e., the standard level of wage is set by the formula of the type of Kir + Liw , where R is the average -Russian salary, W is the average salary of the region, for I and LI -increasing coefficients for the I -CC -qualifying level. Accordingly, the size of the salary of even the scientific and technical worker of the lowest qualification level of the most “youngest” qualification group (technician-designer, drawer-designer) for the scientific institution located in a particular region cannot be lower than the amount of the average-aged and average Russian salaries (we consider both increasing coefficients equal to one in a particular region).
The subordinate fan scientific organizations are distributed unevenly in Russia. At least half of scientific and technical workers operate in Moscow and the region, St. Petersburg and regions-regions where the salary marks the average Russian (for example, the average monthly salary in 2014 in Moscow amounted to 61,400 rubles, 39,100 rubles in the Moscow region, in St. Petersburg-40,700 rubles, 32,600 rubles per month, according to the data, according to the data, according to the data, according to the data, according to the data. Rosstat [2] ). Taking advantage of the data of Rosstat, we can confidently say that even the minimum amount of the average monthly salary of a scientific and technical worker of a subordinate fan of organization can not be lower than 70 thousand rubles. I emphasize that we are talking about the lower level (the highest qualification level of the “youngest” qualification group is a laboratory assistant, an internsor-researcher), and the level of salaries of researchers should be much higher. Having admitted that the average salary will be higher than the minimum one and a half times (this, obviously, is an assessment from below), let's see how much money it will be required to pay the scientific and technical workers of Fano organizations.
The last in time data on the numerical composition of the Fano workers, given in the dedicated document on the Fano website [3] , indicate that more than 141 thousand employees work in the Russian organizations, of which 79 thousand people, including researchers, are 49 thousand people. It turns out that - taking into account insurance premiums (and regression) - only more than 120 billion rubles will be required to pay the labor of researchers with the current number. per year. Since the supported scientific project should provide not only the payment of salaries, but also purchases for research, business trips, the costs of maintaining the Central Committee of the CCP, and generally, and, having admitted that no more than 70% of the total cost of financing the project will have to support the support of scientific and technical projects more than 170 billion rubles. per year. This money does not include wages of 62 thousand inexpensive personnel, which includes not the lowest paid employees - directors, deputy directors, chief accountants, heads of planned departments, etc. We also did not take into account that the level of payment of leading researchers should be at least 4 medium -sized salaries (which means salaries at least 250 thousand per month for Moscow). Finally, we did not take into account the planned expenses for maintaining the scientific infrastructure of institutions. With this in mind - while maintaining the current number of researchers - it turns out that the total amount of financing of state assignment should significantly exceed 200 billion rubles. per year.
Is it a lot or little? After the sequestra, the total funding of the state assignment of all (not only scientific) subordinate fans of organizations in 2015 should amount to 61.3 billion rubles, and the total budget of Fano (including the costs of its apparatus, capital construction, etc.) - 83.5 billion rubles. It turns out that the transition to a new system of state -owned formation according to the methodological instructions established by the draft rules should lead to a reduction in the number of researchers by more than three times (and this is the most conservative assessment). Thus, even temporary financing within the state assignment will be provided with no more than 30% of researchers.
Researchers who have not been among such “lucky ones” can continue to work at the expense of grants, contracts and business contracts (unless, of course, they are available and allow you to pay at least official salaries). But the usual grant of the Russian fund of fundamental research will only be enough to pay one employee a official salary of the current level. And really large in terms of financing of projects (megagrators, grants of the Russian Scientific Fund, large lots of the FCP) are not so. And many of their owners are likely to be among the recipients of projects as part of state assignment.
But even successful work and the availability of large projects for financing cannot serve as a guarantee that there will always be funds for “extra -budgetary” rates. For it does not insure of cases of “system failure”, which occurred, for example, at the end of the FCP for research and development and scientific personnel at the end of 2013: by the beginning of 2014, grants and lots have ended in the framework of the old versions of these FCPs, and until money is received in the framework of the FCP on research and development of 2014–2020 and the Russian scientific fund (heir to the Federal Antimonopoly Service (heir to the FCP "Personnel") Since the beginning of 2014 - 6–9 months. With the new system, such a systemic failure will entail the general dismissal of those employees who work in the organization at the expense of “extra -budget”.
Things are going on, the office writes
It is interesting whether they think in the Ministry of Education and Science that only a radical reduction in the number of researchers of subordinate fan organizations will help to raise the productivity of Russian science? Despite the fact that the leadership of the Ministry of Education and Science believes that noticeable reductions in former academic institutions are necessary, it is doubtful that it believes that in addition to the transfer of the vast majority of researchers to temporary rates, simultaneously three- or four-time reduction in the number of full-time researchers.
Конечно, можно себе представить министра-вредителя, который через 2–3 года будет уже с полным основанием говорить, что вузовский сектор науки существенно опережает бывший академический по публикационным показателям. Однако правда, похоже, проще и печальнее: вероятно, сотрудники министерства не удосужились провести элементарных подсчетов и оценить, во что выльется предлагаемая в методических рекомендациях схема формирования госзадания для, к примеру, подведомственных ФАНО институтов. К сожалению, уровень проработки и подготовки многих появляющихся в последнее время министерских проектов документов таков, что волосы дыбом встают (из самого последнего можно назвать модифицированную версию государственной Программы фундаментальных научных исследований, методологические основы отчета публикаций российских авторов в научных журналах и т. д.). Видно, что их составителей на деле заботила только одна-единственная вещь — отчитаться к положенному сроку, что «бумага выпущена», а там хоть трава не расти.
Если вернуться к проекту обсуждаемых методических рекомендаций, то неряшливость, проявленная при разработке документа, вылезает то там то сям. Скажем, если позиции ведущих исследователей должны распределяться в рамках ведомственного конкурса, то откуда берется твердая уверенность, что в каждой из более чем 700 подведомственных ФАНО научных организаций будет работать хотя бы один отобранный по конкурсу ведущий исследователь? А в Минобрнауки, видимо, уверены, что в каждом институте будет несколько ведущих исследователей: предполагается, что не менее 15% субсидии на выполнение госзадания пойдет на обеспечение деятельности ведущих исследователей.
Если же посмотреть на детали, в которых, как говорится, скрывается дьявол, то мы увидим, что о них составители документа не задумывались вовсе. Общие слова об организации конкурсов никак не затрагивают критически значимых вопросов о конкурсных регламентах, отборе экспертов, предотвращении конфликта интересов, корректном использовании наукометрических показателей и пр. Можно, конечно, заметить, что в методических рекомендациях и не нужно всё подробно излагать — каждое ведомство подготовит соответствующие положения с учетом специфики работы подведомственных организаций. Но если опуститься на грешную землю, то совершенно очевидно, что разумное решение этой объективно трудной задачи находится заведомо за пределами возможностей любой ведомственной бюрократии (не важно, идет ли речь о Минобрнауки, ФАНО или иной структуре).
Хорошо известно, сколь «объективно и беспристрастно» проходят в наших условиях конкурсы по распределению крупных проектов, и не приходится сомневаться, что в случае, когда речь пойдет не просто о получении значительного финансирования, но и о возможности продолжать работу, всё будет еще хуже, чем обычно. Ни о каком беспристрастном отборе лучших на внешних и внутренних конкурсах говорить не придется.
А если вспомнить о том, что работу по организации конкурсов на поддержку научных проектов и ведущих исследователей в рамках госзадания придется вести одновременно с процессами оценки научных организаций и реструктуризации сети этих организаций, то ситуация становится откровенно абсурдной. Если использовать бытовые аналогии, то подходящей была бы семья, которая наряду и одновременно с похоронами решила провести свадьбу и переезд на новое место жительство.
Катастрофическое увеличение нестабильности, вызванное реализацией желания высшего научного начальства провести несколько существенных перетрясок сразу, создаст совершенно нерабочую обстановку и приведет к активизации утечки мозгов, с которой, вроде как, хотят бороться. Впрочем, главное для чиновников, как уже говорилось, — это своевременно отчитаться о выполнении указаний и планомерном продолжении успешного реформирования. Поэтому спасение утопающих по-прежнему остается делом рук самих утопающих. Только жесткая реакция снизу поможет не допустить реализации бюрократического апокалипсиса во всей его красе.
1. http://regulation.gov.ru/project/24988.html
2. gks.ru/wps/wcm/connect/rosstat_main/rosstat/ru/statistics/wages/