Internationalisation in Science in the Prism of Bibliometric Indicators

Abstract

Powerful engines tend to support internationalisation: self-organisation of scientific communities regardless of national borders; international and supranational top down programmes; side effects of economic globalisation; all these trends being boosted latterly by the ICT/Internet revolution. However, internationalisation meets several obstacles: resistance of the national structure in most aspects of innovation systems; proximity effects anchored in infra-structural factors; inertia of personal and institutional networks. Internationalisation of competition and cooperation does not necessarily imply fewer discrepancies in national performances. Bibliometric studies of scientific journals profiles, collaborative and other scientific networks, spatial distribution of scientific activity, tend to validate a real but slow process of the fading of borders. In the last decade advances appear more in globalisation of scientific communication and increase of aggregate collaboration figures than in the geographic distribution of knowledge sources, the reshaping of co-operation networks and the modification of interdisciplinary balances in connection with new growth regimes of science.