ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a diachronic analysis of the transformation of the Chinese research system in the past three decades. For readers who are unfamiliar with it, Section 2.3 provides a schematic overview of the main organizations operating at different levels of this system. Section 2.4.1 will begin by analyzing the starting position of the Chinese research system on a continuum across six dimensions, which will be introduced in the theoretical section 2.2. Sections 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 continue by providing diachronic analyses of the main changes introduced in two time-periods: 1986-95 and 1996-2005. These two ten-year periods roughly coincide with the seventhth and eighth five-year plans, and the ninth and tenth five-year plans respectively. In the first of these five-year plans, Chinese S&T planners outline new measures and aims. It is therefore often in the first years of these periods that a start is made with the implementation of changes, which are then developed in more detail in the next ten years. A third period only started in recent years and was outlined in the eleventh five-year plan and the “medium-to-long-term S&T development plan” (see, among others, Cao et al. 2006). As it is as yet unclear how the announced measures will be implemented, and what their effect will be, the discussion of this current and future period will be very limited in scope.
