Training Young Scientists at a Mexican Public University: Overcoming Academic Segmentation and Creating New Forms of Knowledge

Scientific production and PhD training are today a world wide enterprise. Most countries are increasing investments in science, technology and innovation. However, the literature emphasizes mainly productivity indicators and the description of "world class universities", to the detriment of data on complex processes of institutionalization at regional universities. This research addresses that void by focussing on the development of high level PhD training in the sciences at a state university in an emerging economy.

Premise. Universities of this type in emerging economies went through two transitions: the move from a teaching institution to a research university, and currently the struggle to overcome traditional disciplinary boundaries in research and graduate training to promote inter-disciplinarity and innovation. What challenges do they face today?

The framework flows from the comparative literature on graduate training, the social construction of boundaries in science and neo-institutionalist sociology. Based on evidence from extensive interviews and documentary sources at the University of Puebla, Mexico, this research documents:

The academic and governance changes that made this institution one of the first state universities in Mexico to establish research and doctoral training in the 1980's in the absence of a developed national policy framework.
Its rapid adaptation to and utilization of a new national policy environment for S&T in the 1990's.
Recent successes in innovation in some fields and collaboration with local firms.
The selective emergence of new regimes of knowledge production and doctoral training that transcend traditional disciplinary boundaries.
The stresses faced by other disciplines in adapting to the current policy and scientific environment.