Is the research system in Hong Kong losing its competitiveness?

Abstract

This book chapter analyzes the competitiveness of the research system in Hong Kong starting in 1996, the year before the transition of sovereignty from Britain to China. The analysis uses data trends and metrics used in the science policy and scientometrics literature, such as revealed comparative advantage, based on multiple secondary sources that relate to output (publications), outcome (citations) and input (funding and researchers) indicators. The findings show that the Hong Kong research system is losing competitiveness in relation to the world average, and facing greater challenges than territories such as Singapore in keeping pace with the ongoing research race in the current competitive global knowledge-dependent economy. The analysis suggests that the explanation for this declining competitiveness may be Hong Kong’s exceedingly underfunded research and academic system, in which researchers work with much fewer resources than their peers in other developed economies. If this underfunding continues, then the knowledge structure of the territory (and its universities) will soon lag behind that of developed countries and may be overtaken by fast-growing developing countries.