Minimum-length research contracts ‘don’t address systemic issues’

Germany’s plan to extend the minimum length of academic contracts for PhD students and postdoctoral researchers fails to address the underlying issues that lead to job insecurity, experts have said.

The German cabinet has approved a draft law which that give employed PhD researchers a first contract of at least three years and postdoctoral researchers a first contract of at least two years, as well as stronger protections for researchers taking parental leave or caring for relatives.

Germany’s Federal Ministry for Research, Technology and Space said in a statement that the aim of the changes was to “provide greater security for scientists”. The move comes after years of criticism of temporary contracts and a lack of long-term opportunities, which have kept many scholars on temporary contracts until their forties or even fifties. 

“It’s not really a systemic change,” said Frank Ziegele, executive director of the Center for Higher Education in Germany. “It just makes the conditions in the current system better.”

The attractiveness of academic careers for younger researchers is a major issue, he said, adding that the debate over whether contracts should last two, three or six years overlooks these larger structural issues.

He said universities needed to invest more heavily in the professional development of researchers on temporary contracts and offer a range of secure roles outside the traditional route to professorship.

“Not all of these postdocs will become professors,” he said. “The problem is not that the postdoc contract is limited. The problem is that there are not many positions at universities which are attractive outside the professorship.”

He pointed to emerging roles in areas such as teaching and learning, research management and specialist research support as possible alternatives. “Some universities are now, for instance, starting to employ instructional designers, which focus on the didactics of online teaching,” he said. 

Ziegele also said the growth of third-party research funding at universities had led to an increase in temporary contracts. Universities may get funding for a project for only three years making it difficult for them to offer permanent employment to researchers whose salaries depend on those grants, he added. 

Francesco Maurelli, co-chair of the Global Young Academy, a group based in Germany that represents early to mid-career scientists around the world, said requiring longer initial contracts would help researchers avoid situations in which they begin a doctorate but run out of funding before finishing it.

“The reforms are partially significant but I don’t think they dramatically change much,” he said. “But the main issue in research is the instability in young researchers’ careers which continues late into their careers, and this structural instability isn’t addressed in this reform.”

He added that there is a structural problem in how research is organised, with one professor on top with a permanent position and lots of people underneath them chasing the next contract. 

The proposed rules give researchers more certainty for two or three years but do little to improve their chances of finding a stable research career afterwards. “Unpredictability is also an aspect that leads to mobility,” he added. 

“[The changes] address the initial step. You have a little bit of bread for two to three years but that doesn’t address what happens after, particularly the chances of getting a permanent position in research.”

seher.asaf@timeshighereducation.com