Significantly lacking in research and development resources compared to developed countries, Korea must efficiently use its limited resources in order to achieve national research and development goals.
In the light of the reality that more than 40% o...
Significantly lacking in research and development resources compared to developed countries, Korea must efficiently use its limited resources in order to achieve national research and development goals.
In the light of the reality that more than 40% of national research and development projects are being carried out by government-funded research institutions, strategic use of budgets for government-funded research institutions is urgently required, and finding scientific and rational budget use and management plan to systematically support such strategic use of budgets of government-funded research institutions.
Until now similar debates have been made focusing on government-funded research institutions in the fields of sciences and technology, but discussions on efficient use and management of research and development budgets of government-funded research institutions in the fields of economics and social and human sciences have not yet been attempted.
National research and development budget supports government-funded research institutions by a double-source method. One is a stable budget supported by direct government funding, while the other is a competitive budget supported through public invitations of research and development projects for government ministries and offices. This method has been used in full scale with policy research grants system being gradually accepted after 1999 establishment of research institutions system, and its purpose was to activate research incentives by introducing competitive system based on market forces.
The purpose of this study is to achieve development of budget system of government-funded research institutions and to increase competitiveness and efficiency of use and management of national research and development budget, by analyzing characteristics of budget system of government-funded research institutions in the fields of economics and social and human sciences and the reality of operation of budget system and discovering problems within budget system, and by suggesting efficient improvement plan.
The budget system was studied in two different aspects - budget structure and budget process. First, study of budget structure is divided into four parts - research and development budget support system, legal basis for research and development budget support, government funding budget structure, and working budget structure - conducting analysis of the reality, while problems such as imbalance between stable budget and competitive budget, excessive competitive principle, disparity in budgets of government-funded research institutions, lack of flexibility in budget system are discussed by each item.
As an improvement plan, this study suggests that as for those projects, which are carried out annually through continued or repeated service contracts due to necessity of project execution by government-funded research institutions, among research and development projects by government ministries and offices, budget support method be changed to direct government funding method, and this study also suggests that operation of each government-funded research institution's own project (basic research project) and research institution evaluation system be changed in order to facilitate execution of policy researches of government ministries and offices through each institution's own project (basic research project).
In addition, reflecting characteristics of government-funded research institutions, this study makes system improvement suggestions such as differentiation of funding support ratios, funding support by total amount method, and avoidance of microscopic close control.
As for budget process, this study analyzes the reality of each step of budget process including budget application, budget establishment, budget deliberation, budget execution, accounting, evaluation process, etc., and problems regarding strategic characteristic and goal-oriented characteristic of national research and development budget, rational decision-making standards and expertise, autonomy of government-funded research institutions, and budget system are discussed by each item.
As an improvement plan, this study suggests to increase efficiency of operation of spending limit system currently in force according to the system of autonomous distribution of total budget amount. This way government-funded research institutions flexibly control research areas or projects depending on government policy goals or environmental changes and deliberate and control budget by utilizing human resources of various experts and specialized inspection standards, and these lead to increase in professionalism in budget establishment and rationality in decision-making.
In other words, this study suggests that the Ministry of Strategy and Finance shall answer to the objective of the system of autonomous distribution of total budget amount, shall delegate spending limit authority to lower levels, and shall fulfill its role of arbitrator of national research and development budget.
In addition, this study suggests system improvement plans such as strengthening of ability to comprehensively control policy goals of national research and development projects, establishment of results-oriented budget, conversion of 'project first - budget later' system, assurance of expertise of budget establishing authorities.
I hope that, with this study as a momentum, there will be further researches and studies on efficient use and management of research and development budgets of government-funded research institutions in the fields of economics and social and human sciences.