Special Issue on Science, Technology and Innovation in Latin America in the Journal of Scientometric Research
Guest Editors: Jacqueline Leta & Kizi Araujo
In the last decades, we have witnessed a strong global growth of science, technology and innovation, as a result of the expansion of investment in human resources and infrastructure for the sector. These efforts, however, did not take place in a balanced way and resulted in greater gaps and a more intense division between countries: producers of knowledge and technology on one side and consumers on the other.
This unbalanced picture led to the establishment of a collaborative model, known as North-South, where the South, that embraces consumers or peripheral countries, establishes strong links with the North, or central countries, in order to overcome its internal deficiencies in science, technology and innovation. In this context Latin America presents itself as a region with little tradition in the sector. Some indicators extracted from the report organized by RICYT in 2019, entitled "El estado de la ciencia: main indicators of Ibero-American / Inter-American science and technology 2019", illustrate this scenario for 2017: (a) investments in science, technology in the region represent 3.1% of all global investment (European countries invest around 22%), (b) the region has 3.7% of the world's researchers (Europe has 30%) and (c) similar shares are seen for the number of scientific publications and patents.
Noteworthy highlighting the central role of universities, especially in the public sector, as the main drivers of scientific and technological activities in Latin America: they concentrate almost 60% of researchers in the region and they have strong financial support from the public sector, which corresponds to 58%. It is also worth mentioning the region's internal inequalities in all sectors and also in science, technology and innovation, where Brazil, Mexico and Argentina, assume central roles with investment rates, human resources and have much higher production than the region's average.
Despite recent efforts, Latin America's current picture points to the need to strengthen the collaborative projects already established with central countries as a way to enlarge the training for and visibility of the region's scientific and technology activities within global science. On the other hand, this picture also raises discussions on the need for Latin American governments to seek internal strategies, such as the expansion of South-South relations, that may lead to a greater local and regional development as well as to a reduction of the region's level of scientific and technological dependency and to the establishment of a common agenda focused on the peculiarities and demands of the region, especially in health sciences.
Recently, global public health crises, such as Zika and COVID-19, have reinforced the strategic character of the whole system of science, technology and innovation in the production of quick and joint responses. At times like these, local competencies may become protagonists and so can break barriers, altering significantly the producer-consumer model of new knowledge.
Considering this brief introduction, this special issue of the
Journal of Scientometric Research (
JSCIRes) will welcome studies in the Latin America context, including comparative or case studies, with the following subjects:
- ST&I indicators, mainly in the field of health sciences or in emerging themes;
- ST&I policies and the impact on reducing local and regional inequalities for the sector;
- Scientific collaboration, with emphasis on local and regional relations;
- Open Access, Open Research Data, Consolidation of local or regional databases, Multilingualism, among other topics to enhance visibility and internationalization;
- Alternative indicators, such as social media metrics, and the impact and influence of the scientific and technological activities in the virtual environment.
Submission Guidelines
To submit the full manuscript, authors should read carefully the journal instructions and requirements in terms of length, reference style. Submissions can be made using the following links:
https://www.journalonweb.com/jscires/Full manuscript to be considered for publication in the Special issue of "Science Technology Innovation and Development in Latin America". Submission of a full manuscript does not indicate automatic acceptance for the present special issue.
All full manuscripts to be considered for the special issue must be submitted through the online submission system and are subjected to double-blind peer review and inclusion in the Special Issue will be determined on a final acceptance decision by the Editor-in-Chief on the basis of peer reviews and recommendations made by the Guest Editors.
Important Dates - Abstract submission deadline: 15th July 2020 (to be sent to the Guest Editors, guesteditors.latinamerica[@]gmail.com)
- Decision by Guest Editors: 31st July 2020
- Full paper submission deadline: 31st October 2020
(Should be submitted to the online journal submission system. In the Submission under this Special Issue. Paper should have a running title STI-Latin America, in the article file. If in any case Authors are not able to submit under Special Issue Login, then submit through the main submission of the journal.) Please follow the Guideline (a & b) of the Journal in submitting abstract and full paper (paper can be submitted in different categories (Perspective paper, Research note, etc). Abstract should follow the guideline of the research article. While submitting full paper, in the cover letter and in the main manuscript first page above the title indicate the category if it is other than a research article.
