Saving the idea of the ‘smart economy’

When  two years ago it became clear that Ireland faced potentially dramatic economic problems as the property market collapsed, the government rightly initiated an analysis of how the country could be regenerated quickly by redirecting the economy from property transactions and domestic consumption to knowledge-based exports. The outcome of this analysis was the paper Building Ireland’s Smart Economy, which has provided the blueprint for this country’s renewal. In chapter 6 of that document the government committed itself to the further development of research, R&D and world class higher education. Many of these objectives were re-affirmed in the recent report of the Innovation Taskforce.

The problem for us now is that the policy imperatives highlighted by the government are being fatally undermined by the absence of any kind of resourcing strategy for the institutions that alone can make all of this happen. As the government has struggled with bringing the public finances under control, it has treated higher education and research just like any other public service, and has cut it and placed major operational constraints on it. Indeed the cuts applied to higher education now look larger than those applied to some other services. And as we have heard this week, these cuts are now set to continue and potentially get worse.

Today’s very timely editorial in the Irish Times underscores all this. As a country, we need to understand that we cannot be a world class innovation and knowledge society unless we are ready to provide the means. We cannot educate students to international standards of excellence while funding higher education with resources more appropriate for a developing country. We cannot be a magnet for R&D while cutting research funding – Ireland’s R&D expenditure is now half of what the government itself has said it should be, and it’s falling. In fact, the only firm policy on higher education resourcing that I can easily identify is the apparent imperative financially to protect the children of wealthy voters; but even they will be educated in deteriorating buildings that are inadequately equipped with student-to-faculty ratios that are unacceptable by international benchmarks.

An innovation culture is not achievable on a shoestring. A smart economy doesn’t materialise just because we call for it, we also need to pay for it. It is high time to align practice with rhetoric.

The government has in fact been good at identifying the way forward, and as a country we now have some excellent policy documents. But however hard it is to find money in our current circumstances to make these policies real, we have to do it. There is no viable alternative. There is no turning back to low value manufacturing and call centres. We are a smart economy and society, or we are nothing. It’s time to face that reality.

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Tags: Building Ireland's Smart Economy, higher education funding, Innovation Taskforce

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