Thirty prominent Croatian scientists from home and abroad have sent an open letter to the government on the situation in the science and higher education sector and on the development plan until 2026, urging the government to seize a historic opportunity and implement the necessary reforms in this sector.

“We have a historic opportunity to implement much needed fundamental reforms, and as a group of scientists we feel qualified to get involved in this process and help improve the quality of Croatian science and higher education as well as the working conditions for scientists and teachers,” the letter says.

The letter listed six fundamental principles and proposed six measures which the signatories believe can have a substantial impact on the quality and international visibility of Croatian science and higher education.

The science and higher education system should be established on the principles of freedom and responsibility, originality and innovation, openness and international visibility, selection and promotion based on merit, responsibility and transparency of funding, and research and teaching ethics.

The signatories called for a new legal framework based on analysis of the existing situation and comparison with practice in scientifically successful European countries. Key stakeholders, in particular prominent scientists and teachers with great international experience and representatives of the European Research Area, should be included in designing new laws and rules, which should then be put to public consultation.

All documents on the implementation of reforms, investments and irregularities, as well as progress reports should be publicly available. A comprehensive, fair and responsible system of programme funding with transparent and measurable success indicators, and an independent and effective quality assurance system should be put in place. The Croatian Science Foundation should be ensured independence in its work.

The last measure calls for establishing a national body for ethics in science and higher education to which all other ethics bodies would be subsidiary.

The signatories noted that Croatia has been allocated comparatively the largest amount of money from the Next Generation EU instrument compared to other EU member states, and that the government has announced the largest investment yet, of HRK 2.4 billion, in science and higher education from the National Recovery and Resilience Plan 2021-2026.

Croatia now has a great opportunity to adopt new legislation, reform the institutions and responsibly distribute considerable funds to increase the quality of Croatian science and higher education. Without systematic reforms based on the objectives and measures set out in the National Development Strategy, Croatia will not be able to move up from the bottom of rankings of European countries, the letter says.

The letter was written by Pavel Gregoric of the Institute for Philosophy, Mirko Planinic of the Faculty of Science, Vlatko Silobrcic of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, and Tomislav Stojanov of the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom.