The native-born Peruvian Enrique Mendizabal about Think Tank rankings, better environment and better funding for Think Tanks, the limits of their responsibility for policy and development and about their role in China, Chile and for the Washington Consensus.
You have been working for and on Think Tanks (TT) for about 10 years now. What has changed in these years?
People are talking more about TT. Definitely in England especially about their role in society. The public is beginning to voice some doubts about them, because of their links to political parties and interest groups. I think in the US it is the same. In Emerging Countries it has become more popular to call yourself a TT. Before they were more likely called Research Centers. This is the most obvious change.
Is it just more fashionable to be a TT, or is their work more requested?
I am a little bit sceptical. I think it has a lot to do with internationals donors. The World Bank and others used to work with NGOs, then directly with states, then with the academic world. Now, as the Evidence Based Policy Discourse has developed, they are more interested in TT. Five years ago we were working in the ODI with organisations that we called TT, even though they didn’t –and often were not. Nowadays many call themselves TT to apply for the programmes of big donors and to get access to new funds. The change was more a tactic than anything else; not that there is anything wrong with this.
There are some rankings of TT periodically published. Do you agree with these rankings?
The effort of identifying think tanks in different countries makes sense and it is useful But ranking TT by region or even globally is useless. It is OK to call Brookings the world’s best, but this does not help think tanks in Poland or Indonesia. Brookings is fantastic, but you can’t compare it with a TT elsewhere, not even in Brasil or China. A TT must be judged in its context.
In what way could Brookings be a role model?
You can learn from them. Lesson on how to manage a TT, how to govern a TT or its organisaitonal set-up, how to finance it, learn about developing a research agenda, etcc. This analysis makes sense. But a ranking does not provide any of this information. Sometimes a TT benefits because of the visibility in rankings but we know that these successes are questionable, to say the least. An alternative to rankings is Prospect Magazine’s UK Think Tanks award. The jury explains why they voted for any TT and how they chose the winners in each category. This may be less spectacular, but it is more useful.
You are familiar to developed as well as to less developed countries. What is TT’s importance for the latter?
I see myself as well as a promoter for more TT in developing countries. But before they can be established there, you need to make sure that other things are in place. They need to have an academic sector, a well functioning state, parties, competing media, well-educated journalists, NGOs, grassroot groups, unions, a strong private sector, etc.. Without these, TT there will be weak.
Which developing or emerging countries have already advanced this way?
I was in China in June, at a TT’s event, talking to TT’s scholars and managers. I was very surprised, because these conversations were far more interesting and nuanced than anything I have heard in the UK or the US. The consensus there was that China needs more and better TT and the question is how to get them. The Chinese system– for whatever reasons – rewards the used of evidence based in policymaking. There is a demand for outputs, for research, for new ideas. China offers some lessons for other emerging countries –certainly for those in its region.
Most of the Middle Income Countries already understand the importance of research in science and technology. The upcoming challenge is to allocate more money into economic and social research. This is also a task for the international development community. Think tanks should not always ask for more money from Aid Agencies. Instead, it would be better if donors used their funds and influence to leverage domestic funds. I am in Peru now. Here there is no need for funds from outside; instead there is a need for ideas on how to mobilise domestic funds to support research and think tanks.
Can TTs in developing countries exist without funding from industrial countries? Does western funding implicate a reproduction of western models?
I will not be too critical with the role of the west as a supporter. Few TT were established without any help from abroad. People who were educated in the US, the EU or Australia often return to their home countries convinced that there is a need for a new TT. This kind of connection is useful. The problem is that may donors tend to go into developing countries with a fixed idea of how TTs there have to look like and what they should work on. It would be better, if these donors established local research funds or encouraged more of these personal and professional connections instead of funding or founding TT directly.
Is domestic funding possible anywhere?
For sure. In every developing country that I have travelled to, there is a private sector that has the money to do this. It could be a task for the developed world to support local philanthropic organisations, by connecting millionaires from USA, EU or Aus to millionaires in those countries, so that they could be convinced about the sense of funding domestic TT. This does not look like a big interference, but in fact it would be a sustainable way of supporting research capacity.
In your opinion, what are the most outstanding positive or negative impacts of TTs’ work?
This is difficult to answer in a direct way, because there have always been successful and less successfull policies. Sometimes there is a TT’s work behind a policy, sometimes not. The lesson is that a TT cannot always be right, and that TTs always have their own interests.
A prime example of TT’s role in developing countries on my opinion is Chile. After Pinochet took over power in 1973 many scientists and researchers were fearing for their lives. They formed groups close to existing organisations and somegathered under the auspicies of the catholic church, as the church was the only organisation that was allowed to hold meetings without asking for permision. They were discussing about how it was possible that Chile suffered from a radical break in its democratic development, and they were working towards the re-establishment of democracy. Many of them later became ministers in the democratic governments that followed. But even more significant that the intellectual contributions of these TTs were the psychological contributions. They laid the foundations for what later on became the Concertacion, a broad democratic movement of those united against Pinochet and which is still nowadays a powerful and multilateral political force in Chile. The think tanks brought them together through meetings and dialogue. They helped them to learn to work with each other.
Would you accept to call the Washington Consensus as an outstanding example for the negative impact of a TT’s work?
I could say that, but for example many in Peru would say that the measures and policies that were implemented under the title of the Washington Consensus, in the long run, were not too bad for the country, in spite of many negative short term impacts, that are undeniable. In social sciences and economics there are few undoubtable facts, everything can be seen from a different perspective. I would like to stress that TT cannot be made responsible for the application of their ideas by politicians. But think tanks still need to be careful when doing their research and attempting to influence. Ideas are powerful.
Even today the economic model is under discussion. And there are a few ‘sides’ to the debate. Think tanks, using the same data are arriving at different conclusions and recommendations. This is because it is not possible for them to separate fact from values. In the end, think tanks, like everyone else are governed by values and use data (and research) to make sense of the world around them.
Rincón América 