the most influential individuals in UK science policy?

By key_concepts_team, on 4 October 2010

6 Responses to “the most influential individuals in UK science policy?”

• 1
  

  Alice Bell wrote on 4 October 2010:
  

  Off the top of my head I’d add Vince Cable, James Wilsdon, Roger Highfield, Mark Henderson, Evan Harris, Ben Goldacre, Fiona Godlee, Richard Horton, Imran Khan, Andrew Lansley, Lord Browne, David Mackay, and Lord Krebs. I’d also add Micheal Gove and possibly someone like Robin Millar, because school-science policy is part of science policy too.

  I’d take David Attenborough out because he rarely makes political points. Brian Cox perhaps? For similar reasons, I’d remove the Archbishop of Canterbury because he rarely talks about science policy, perhaps Archbishop Vincent Nicholl would be more appropriate?

  For more, you should REALLY pick up a copy of the Times on Thursday…

• 2
  

  Kieron Flanagan wrote on 4 October 2010:
  

  This list seems a bit odd to me. Nature and Science have very little influence on UK science policy so far as I know. David Attenborough and the Archbishop of Canterbury still less. Wellcome Trust and CRUK – definitely right.

  GSK, well I would add Astra-Zeneca as well (they have a VP for science policy). European Science Foundation – really? On what basis? Put in the EC Commissioner for Research, or the head of the ERC maybe (they have little enough influence on UK science policy but far more than the ESF)…

  Who would I add? (James) Dyson. The CBI. And I would agree that all the people Alice Bell lists above are all potentially influential, especially James Wilsdon and his team at the Royal Society. I would also add two more academics – Ben Martin of SPRU and Luke Georghiou at Manchester.

  Phil Willis? Seriously? Yet you missed out the Secretary of State?

  PS I have to confess I am neither an alumnus, a member of staff nor a student – there just wasn’t any other option to select… 😉

  @kieronflanagan (kieron.flanagan@manchester.ac.uk)

• 3
  

  David Colquhoun wrote on 4 October 2010:
  

  You can tell this was a science policy wonks meeting because the list contains very few actual scientists

• 4
  

  Svetlana Pertsovich wrote on 4 October 2010:
  

  @David Colquhoun

  Settle down, David. Probably archbishop of Canterbury is instead of them 😉

  Heh… In the light of this the crisis in UK science is not surprising… 🙁

• 5
  

  William Cullerne Bown wrote on 4 October 2010:
  

  This list is conceptually flawed in that “science policy” is taken to be a real existing constellation of thought, people and institutions, like “the media” or “Hollywood”. It isn’t.

• 6
  

  STS Observatory » Blog Archive » Eureka 100: the Science List wrote on 7 October 2010:
  

  […] as Alice Bell hinted in her comment on the key concepts team’s recent post on the most influential people in UK science policy here on the STS Observatory, The Times produced its own list: the Eureka 100. It’s behind […]