Author Location Data

For author location data, we obtained the full citation records of all publications between 1981–2013 for Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Sudan and Libya. For rest of the countries (with larger number of publications), we estimated indigeneity using statistical sampling of records for each year and analyzing address information of reprint authors using our text parsing routines coded in Matlab^TM. The robustness of the results was evaluated and is provided in detail for each country (Table D in S1 File).

Subject Area Data

We obtained subject area data for each country by analyzing the country results in multi- year intervals (1981–85, 1986–90, 1991–95, 1996–2000, 2001–2005, 2006–2010, and 2011–2013) with research area analysis in Web of Science. This provides count of papers for each area. It should be noted that a paper maybe assigned multiple subject areas (e.g. it may have two areas such as Ecology and Marine & Freshwater Biology) associated with it. We conducted this search for 175 areas that we determined to be relevant leaving out areas from social sciences (such as economics and business management). The subject areas were consolidated into 15 categories (Table A in S1 File) based on results reported in [13], wherein a systematic decomposition of a journal-journal citation matrix was used to identify inter-connected disciplines. We used those results with some modifications for engineering disciplines relevant for the regional economies.

Publications Volume

The total publications for a country i in year t was defined as: (1)

The whole-counting approach was used. If a publication had three co-authors, and one of the co-authors had an address in Kuwait, the publication would be included as a full count for Kuwait. This approach provided an upper limit accounting of the publications for each country. The attribution for each country was made only on the basis of address information, and the citizenship or national origin of authors was not taken into account. The global share of each country was computed for each year t as: (2)

N is the number of countries with journal publications records in year t.

Scientific Productivity

From Lotka’s pioneering work from almost a century ago, in which he analyzed patterns of scientific productivity for chemists and physicists [14], to current work in scientometrics [15], patterns in research productivity have been continually examined. Productivity (defined as per capita scientific publications) is an important measure when considering training and producing researchers [1]. Here, we measured productivity as the ratio of annual publications and population for each country and computed the scientific productivity, η_i of country i in year t, as: (3)

P_i(t) is population of country i in year t.

This ratio (of total publications to total population) has been used historically [1–2]. Ideally, the number of total scientists and researchers should be used instead of total population of a country. The annual data of total researchers in each MENA country over the last thirty years, however, is not available. Given this limitation, the total population serves as a proxy variable for determining productivity. This allowed for a common basis of comparison with other countries outside the region, however, it also includes the structural differences in the fraction of population devoted to research.

Scientific Indigeneity

The issue of location is paramount when accounting for national scientific research activity–particularly when the aim is to investigate the development of local scientific capacity. Prior research has shown that knowledge flows (measured by patent citations) tend to stay geographically localized due to the positive influence of spatial proximity on knowledge sharing and interpersonal relationships [16]. In the age of globalization, national systems of innovation can become more relevant, not less [17], as domestic institutions (shaped by policy) improve competitiveness through building absorptive and innovative capacity and attracting and leveraging resources that are increasingly global. It has been shown that while simple knowledge diffuses equally to close and distant actors, socially proximate recipients have the greatest advantage over distant actors for knowledge of moderate complexity [18], and co-location is also important for firm to university collaborations [19].

Trends in scientific research teams [20], and international collaboration patterns have been investigated extensively, with results showing a growing fraction of scientific research being undertaken by teams of collaborators across different universities [21] and from multiple countries [22]. This research did not investigate differences that may arise by country.

In recognition of the globalization trends, and with the aim of getting insights relevant for domestic capacity development (a question that arose from our interviews), we posed a question of indigeneity–i.e. how much research is driven by domestic (resident) scientists in a country. Our basis of measuring research activities is publications data, and we make an assumption that corresponding authors play a key role in the work reported in a paper. Furthermore, the presence of these researchers in a location will impact effective knowledge transfer, training, mentorship and other activities leading to long-term capacity development. The corresponding author is often fully knowledgeable about the work that is presented in the paper and manages the paper through the peer-review process. She may be the researcher who has done the primary work, or is the senior researcher who has been a central part of the work. Our choice of corresponding author allows for striking a balance in the issue of first and last author contributions, where in some fields, the first author represents the researcher who has done the primary work, whereas in some cases the last author is the main driver of the research.

We compute the indigeneity, λ_i of country i’s scientific publications, as: (4) where x_i is the number of publications in year t where the corresponding author has address in country i.

We note that the indigeneity metric represents the domestic side of the knowledge production equation, and does not capture the extended ‘scientific wealth’ of a country via its intellectual diaspora in any given year. It is likely that countries that export high percentages of their educated elites would appear to have less successful educational institutions than those with a less important intellectual diaspora. The metric developed here partially captures the level of domestic scientific capacity and also includes the returning diaspora. It, however, precludes the assessment of export of scientific wealth to other countries as a result of migration out of MENA countries.

Scientific Specialty–Revealed Scientific Advantage

The disciplinary focus–or specialization in specific scientific fields–is an important characteristic frequently used in assessments of national research [23]. Such characterization is particularly useful in international comparisons where countries with small total shares in global publications may have larger shares in specific areas. In past research, it has been found that emerging countries often show sharp patterns of specialization (with prominent focus in a few fields) whereas scientifically strong as well as scientifically weak countries may show no particular pattern [1].

In this work, we employ the concept of Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA)—used for determining national trade advantage compared to global exports- in the new context of knowledge economies and apply the definition of RCA on publications (Section A in S1 File). The RCA of publications in different scientific fields has been assessed previously [1], and relative measures for citations are also used that normalize for country size and global activity [23].

Here we denote the RCA for publications as Revealed Scientific Advantage (RSA), and define it as the ratio of the fraction of publications in a subject within a country’s total publications to the fraction of publications in that subject in world total publications. It thus allows for assessing the disciplinary focus of research output of a country while accounting for global trends in research in particular fields. A country with an RSA>1 in a subject area has more publications than the expectation, while an RSA < 1 in a subject indicates publications less than the global level in that area.

An advantage in publications is not a sufficient condition for building strategic capacity, and accounting for quantity of publications is a partial measure at best for gauging strength in research. However, an examination of relative research foci in a country can provide useful information for understanding national trends. Given that research outputs are to some extent organic (and not fully controlled by policy), decision makers and administrators of national science and education agencies can utilize this metric to identify strategic areas for growth.

In our analysis, we agglomerated 175 scientific fields (associated with publications in the Science Citation Index) into 15 disciplines (Table A in S1 File) and evaluated the RSA values in 5-year intervals (Section E in S1 File). We defined Revealed Scientific Advantage (RSA) as: (5) where ρ_ij(t) is the RSA of country i in field j in year t, X_i is total publications of country i in year t and x_ij is publications of country i in field j in year t.

Field-Visits and Interviews

We conducted semi-structured interviews with students, faculty, senior university administrators (including presidents and college deans), technology company executives, and education policy makers in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and UAE during 2013–2014. In addition, we also made visits to a number of institutions in Morocco, Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon during 2013–2015. Some of the institutions we visited included: King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (Saudi Arabia), King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (Saudi Arabia), Dhahran Techno Valley (Saudi Arabia), King Abdullah Economic City (Saudi Arabia), Saudi Oil Company (Saudi Arabia), Qatar University, Texas A&M University–Doha (Qatar), Qatar Foundation, Kuwait University, Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research, Kuwait Foundation for Advancement of Science, Advanced Technology Company (Kuwait), Gulf University of Science and Technology (Kuwait), Masdar Institute for Science and Technology (UAE), Abu Dhabi Technology Investment Company (UAE), UAE University- Al Ain (UAE), and Khalifa University (UAE). The on-site interviews and discussions informed the analysis we present here. Some of the key issues that were highlighted included fluctuating (rather than sustained) state support and funding for science, inadequate students’ preparation in science and math in early and secondary level education, negative impacts of socio-political turmoil, and emphasis on international collaborations.

Global Share and Productivity

As a first step, we determined the share of total publications of each MENA country over time, and found that a few countries have made gains in the last decade (Table 1). The combined global share for the region grew from ~0.63% in 1981 to 1.83% in 2013 (Fig 1). In 2013, the regional top five countries (in global share) were Saudi Arabia (0.54%), Egypt (0.48%), Tunisia (0.16%), Algeria (0.12%), and Morocco (0.08%). The combined share of Saudi Arabia and Egypt comprised more than half of the total MENA share in global publications. The development trajectory of the two countries, particularly in the last decade however, has interesting features.

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Fig 1. The combined global share in journal publications of all 17 MENA countries increased from 0.63% in 1981 to 1.83% in 2013.

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Table 1. Share of global publications, productivity and indigeneity of publications from MENA and other selected countries.

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Saudi Arabia’s publications share, starting at 0.07% in 1981, initially improved for a few years, after which there were two decades of stagnation and decline. A turning point arrived in 2007 when the number of publications started to increase sharply, a time that coincides with large investments in higher education. The global share of Saudi publications climbed from 0.13% in 2006 to 0.54% in 2013. This rapid increase has garnered attention and debate. A number of experts in our semi-structured interviews noted specific policy measures, new programs for higher education and research, and programs for incentivizing faculty to increase publications as the drivers for this growth (Section A in S1 File). However, some also pointed out the difficulty in clearly gauging the development of local scientific base in the country with publications data given the extensive non-resident, visiting-affiliations for international researchers in recent years (Section B in S1 File). This insight inspired our development of the indigeneity measure for a better assessment of the local knowledge base in countries aiming to develop scientific research capacity.

In Egypt, with a global share of 0.33% in 1981 (the largest share for any single MENA country at the time), there was little growth and mostly stagnation till 2005. The trajectory turned upwards around 2007 in part due to the launching of a ten-year (2007–16) scientific research development plan along with several joint cooperation programs in science and technology with the European Union, Japan, Germany, India, and other countries (Section A in S1 File). There was steady growth until 2011 (coinciding with the Egyptian revolution) after which the rate of increase has slowed (Figure D in Section C in S1 File).

When compared along an international yardstick, the shares for the comparison group of seven countries ranged from 19.2% for US to 0.6% for Norway in 2013 (Figure B in Section B in S1 File). The total global share of Egypt (largest MENA country with population of 82 million) at 0.48% was lower than the share of Norway (smallest country in our comparison group with population of 5 million) at 0.6%. The productivity results (publications normalized by population) show that in spite of some gains made in terms of total publications, a wide gap has opened up between the productivity of MENA region and some countries in the comparison group (Fig 2). The median productivity in MENA increased by 10.6% on average per year between 1981 and 2013 changing from 11 to 111 publications per million people (with Qatar achieving the highest regional level of 377 papers per million in 2013) (Figure B in Section B in S1 File). In the comparison group, on the other hand, South Korea had an average annual productivity growth rate of 24.7% (from 6 to 968 papers per million), Turkey 18.7% (from 6 to 312 papers per million), and Singapore 16.3% (from 59 to 1913 papers per million) during the same time period (Fig 2). Overall countries in the comparison group progressed faster thereby increasing the productivity gap with MENA region.

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Fig 2. Median productivity (publications/population) in MENA countries (solid red line) shows an enlarged gap in comparison to Singapore, Norway, Australia, and South Korea.

The dots show data of individual MENA countries, the grey region encompasses the range of data for MENA.

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In digging deeper into the growth trajectories, individual MENA countries show year-to-year fluctuating patterns of stagnation, decline, and growth (Figures B-E in Section C in S1 File). Several countries have repeatedly undergone a decrease in annual output (a contraction in annual number of publications from one year to the next) leading to an erosion of any earlier gains. This partly explains the widened productivity gap. With the exception of Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, and Oman, all other MENA countries show multiple instances of negative growth (less than -0.2%) or stagnation (growth rate between -0.2% to 0.2% with the results generally robust for other thresholds such as 0.1% or 0.5%) during 1991–2013 (Fig 3).

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Fig 3. Average rates of change in annual publications show repeated instances of decline and stagnation (shown in red and black) in publications from MENA countries in contrast to countries in the comparison group (below the gray line).

The average-three year publications growth rate was computed and classified as unchanged if it was between -0.2% to 0.2%, increasing if greater than 0.2% and decreasing if less than—0.2%.

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In Tunisia, productivity increased from 4.4 in 1981 to 248.2 (papers per million) in 2013. However, due to socio-political unrest since 2011, the growth rate has stalled in the country (Figures B-E in Section C in S1 File). Similar impacts of turmoil and military conflicts are visibly perceptible in the data for others including Iraq (1991–1993 and 2003–2004), Kuwait (1991–1993), and Syria (2012–2013).

The rapidly rising trajectories of Singapore and South Korea (as evident in Fig 2) show the impact of sustained policy focus on national technological development (in the backdrop of a more peaceful internal social environment unmarked by military conflict). The rate of growth accelerated in some countries (Qatar, Morocco, Egypt) in MENA in the last seven years (Figures B-E in Section C in S1 File). The crucial issue, however, will be to sustain a rising trend that (at least in the past three decades) has proven to be a tough challenge in the region [24].

Indigeneity

We conducted the indigeneity analysis for the period 2000–2013. The details of the computation and robustness of the results are provided in Table D in S1 File. For the cases where statistical sampling was used, the margin of error was ~4% or less at a 95% confidence level.

The results at the regional level show that the share of local research (as measured by corresponding authors based in the country) has consistently fallen with median for MENA region changing from 73% in 1981 to 52% in 2013 (Fig 4). At the country level, Algeria (70%) had the highest while Yemen (26%) had the lowest indigeneity in 2013 (Figure B in Section D in S1 File). Yemen is followed by Libya at 31% and Qatar at 33% level of domestic corresponding authorship (i.e. indigeneity).

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Fig 4. Share of papers with domestic corresponding authors (solid red line shows median value and dots are data of individual countries in MENA).

Median indigeneity in 2013 is 52% in MENA compared to 73% in 2000. Algeria had highest (70%) and Yemen had lowest (26%) indigeneity levels in 2013.

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In Yemen and Libya, the local socio-political unrest and lack of funding support can be attributed to the low levels of domestic research. In the case of Qatar, however, foreign collaborations have been extensively pursued (Section B in S1 File). Senior research administrators in the region pointed out in our interviews that the international collaborations are being pursued for acquiring new knowledge and technical capabilities, and for bringing nascent local programs of teaching and research at par with global practices. In some cases, local researchers seek foreign collaborations due to insufficient local critical mass and lack of local collaborators in their specific fields. The combined effect of these efforts at the macro-level in the country is an indigeneity level that is among the lowest in MENA states.

In the comparison group, China, Turkey, and South Korea have maintained a relatively high degree of indigeneity (from 85–89% in 2000 to 84–90% in 2013), whereas in Australia, Norway and Singapore the indigeneity measure has changed from ~73–79% in 2000 to 62–65% in 2013 (Fig 4). The US fares in the middle going from 82% to 73% in this period.

These results show a noticeable shift in rate of change around the middle of the last decade for many countries (Figure B in Section D in S1 File). In investigating further, we find that the median annual indigeneity change for MENA increases from -0.03% in 2000–2005 period to -2.7% during 2006–2013. On the other hand, the median annual change for comparison countries is -0.7% and -0.8% respectively during these periods (Figures C-D in Section D in S1 File). The indigeneity in MENA has thus decreased at more than three folds the rate (-2.7% versus -0.8%) as compared to the other group of countries during 2006–2013.

These decreasing levels can be explained in part with the role of modern information technologies (IT) in reducing transaction costs and increasing international collaborations. Researchers, however, have documented the limits to benefits that can be gained from collaboration showing that remote collaborations can be prone to problems of coordination [25], and that benefits may accrue only to an extent after which reverse trends may take hold wherein more collaboration impedes productivity [26]. Recent research also shows that while geographically dispersed teams have access to diverse information that can potentially increase novelty, the dispersion can make it difficult to integrate and effectively utilize the information for developing new knowledge [27].

Scientific research and innovation have long been an international enterprise. However, with increased global interactions in this century, scholars in development and innovation theory seek to explicitly investigate the emerging Global Innovation Networks [28], and advance the framework of National Systems of Innovation (NSI) that has received significant interest since the 1990s [29]. Researchers note that as countries seek to catch up, the maturity and nature of their NSIs will impact their role, hierarchy, and influence within the global networks. Thus, even though the global scientific enterprise becomes more connected, the level and quality of domestic human capital and scientific expertise remains vital for linking local research to global research efforts and for utilizing global research for local applications and needs.

As the question of international collaborations (that are partially captured with the indigeneity metric) is of increasing salience for countries aiming to build local capacity, we analyzed how productivity and indigeneity are related. We found that the correlation between these two metrics was negative (Fig 5), except for a few cases (Figures E-G in Section D in S1 File), showing that the productivity gains in these countries have occurred in step with declining indegeniety. This indicates that international collaborations have contributed to the rise in productivity. The impact of international collaborations on scientific contributions by countries has been noted in previous studies [7, 28], and this result confirms those findings. However, it also provides a further nuance by indicating whether the drivers of the collaborations are domestic or foreign (with country of corresponding author serving as a proxy indicator) and flags implications for countries seeking to develop local capacity.

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Fig 5. Productivity versus indigeneity shows a negative correlation.

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The overall comparative results show that the locus of scientific work has shifted out of national borders in MENA countries, and raises important questions for domestic scientific research capacity. While other countries (such as Singapore and Norway) also show decreasing trends for indigeneity, the impact of this trend for MENA can be consequential, given the region’s low level of productivity and lack of local research base. The actual (as opposed to expected) impacts of extensive international collaborations needs further understanding as countries in the region attempt to quickly catch up and gain a larger presence in the global research arena.

Specialty

Our analysis of scientific specialty shows that the focus has shifted from some disciplines such as geological sciences/petroleum engineering to other areas. There is consistent (though modest) growth in the emerging areas of biomedical sciences, in mechanical/industrial/aeronautical engineering, and in computer sciences/electrical engineering (Fig 6). The trends for computer science have to be considered with caution, however, since only journal publications were analyzed, whereas many researchers in this field tend to publish their work in conference papers.

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Fig 6. Revealed Scientific Advantage in geological sciences/petroleum engineering, chemistry/chemical engineering, and environmental sciences/civil engineering has waned over time, but has modestly increased in some other areas such as biomedical sciences, computer science/electrical engineering, and mechanical/industrial/aeronautical engineering in the MENA region.

Note the different x-scales in each plot.

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This changing pattern can be attributed to a mix of specific policies such as emphasis on IT and establishment of new regional medical schools in the last decade [30]. The increasing trends in newer areas can have beneficial contributions for scientific competitiveness that can lead to industrial development and economic diversification [31]. However, key questions emerge for the implications of the declining focus on strategically relevant areas (such as in geological sciences and chemical engineering that are relevant to oil and gas sectors) that are expected to remain important for the region in the coming decade.

At the individual country level, patterns of specialization in a few fields are evident (with large RSA values ranging from 4–12 in some subjects) in the first period of the analysis (1981–1985), and the narrow emphasis has broadened over time (Figures A, D-I in Section E in S1 File). In the comparison group, the results show that Norway (with a large oil and gas sector) has maintained strong emphasis in geological sciences/petroleum engineering. Singapore and South Korea (with electronics and semi-conductor industry) have strong focus in materials science (Figures B-C in Section E in S1 File).

This detailed regional and country level characterization of patterns of specialization and research emphasis can serve as an important tool for informing policy and for assessing how research activities may or may not be along trajectories that support broader national development goals and needs.

Current challenges

In our semi-structured interviews and discussions, which included a wide range of stakeholders ranging from university presidents to faculty and students, a few common issues were raised consistently across all countries we visited: (1) need for “continuity of forward-looking policies” with continued financial support for science and technology over the next couple of decades; (2) “chronic shortage of human capital” and difficulty of attracting good quality faculty in sufficient numbers; (3) insufficient career incentives that have stymied local interest in pursuing long-term research and technical work in science and innovation; and (4) poor quality of school-level education in science and mathematics that leaves students inadequately prepared for university education.

These findings provide explanations for some of the trends and features that emerge from our quantitative bibliometrics analysis. The multiple periods of contraction in scientific output in most MENA countries have left deep uncertainties in academic and research communities. Thus, while they appreciate recent investments, there is persistent concern for long-term sustained support.

In the interviews, several professors pointed to not having a critical mass of other colleagues with whom they have shared interests and complementary areas of expertise in their institution, as well as incentives for faculty that encourage increasing number of publications. The combination of lack of local human capacity and specific measures implemented to boost output may partly explain the rapidly decreasing indigeneity levels that we find in our analysis.