Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system: An underestimated tool in reflexive governance of research evaluation in academia

Introduction Managerial university and New Public Management (NPM) have been criticised for, inter alia, indicatorism, quantification, metrification, economisation and “publish or perish” pressures (e.x. by Lorenz (2015)), in favor of reversing back the managerial trend during the last decades. While abandoning NPM in academia does not seem feasible, the present article attempts to weaponise new era of managerial university, and specifically responsible research and innovation (RRI), by state-of-the-art M&E systems and practices. RRI has attracted considerable attention not only in academia by theorization and conceptualization, but also in recent high-level agenda and regulations such as the European Horizon 2020, and also at a more abstract level with on-going moral, societal and philosophical ascriptions. Based on Guston (2004), RRI could be characterized by four dimensions of anticipation, reflection, open debate and responsiveness/ flexibility. Governance of RRI, which acts as an umbrella over the whole RRI system, could be linked to above dimensions to yield anticipatory and reflexive governance of RRI. The governance itself lies within the paradigm of institutionalism and market failure, in which free-market is known as a failed mechanism for total management of so-called externalities of research and innovation, taking responsibility as an externality. The present paper addresses application of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems into reflexive governance of research evaluation in academia to better achieve responsibility goals and RRI. In fact, instead of mere criticism of managerial university, the paper attempts to modify it by introduction of the application of state-of-the-art M&E systems into RRI reflexive governance and NPM. In contrast to other themes that are mostly of a priori (foresight) nature and tackled to some extent, such as anticipatory governance, risk assessment, impact assessment, societal impacts and soft law of RRI, the reflexive governance could encompass posterior and reflexive monitoring and evaluation as a tool to achieve accountability and responsibility goals. While monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems has traditionally been developed separately, it has recently been introduced to the concept of RRI within a development theme by the 2015 Conference on Monitoring and Evaluation for Responsible Innovation being held by Wageningen University. In contrast with the development theme, the present research suggests M&E system as a useful tool for reflexive governance of research evaluation in academia.