Six major challenges facing public intervention in higher education, science, technology and innovation

The recent developments around the European Research Area call for in-depth review, analysis and debate about research and innovation policies. This article aims to participate in this debate by proposing an analysis of on-going transformations that require us to reconsider the historical assimilation of public intervention in science and technology with national policy. It identifies six challenges, which entail radical changes in the locus, formulation and implementation of science, technology, higher education and innovation policies, and which call for renewed empirical and theoretical work to reconsider our accumulated knowledge in science policy studies.