The disposable Ph.D
The Economist recently carried an article about how and why Ph.D degrees were losing their sheen. In summary, its argument was basically this:
- Designed to be a programme for preparing candidates for an academic career, there is now an oversupply of Ph.D holders, with the US itself handing 64,000 doctorates every year.
- Given the low stipends/scholarships that bright Ph.D candidates are given, they have become "cheap, highly motivated and disposable labour" that is driving most of the research today, and are being taken for a ride with promises of a better future for the present struggles. The so-called "postdocs" are also victims of this infrastructure, the post itself being a result of an attempt to fix the demand-supply mismatch.
- Does having a Ph.D add value to your career? The Economist says its definitely better than a bachelor's degree, but not much value-addition over a master's - in fact you may be disadvantaged. The Ph.D skills of deep analysis, research are not what today's fast moving markets are looking for. The more qualified a candidate is, the more likely he is to be dissatisfied and de-motivated with the work at hand.
Now, here's what I think on the Economist's viewpoint:
- The demand-supply mismatch argument does not hold in India, since there is a large shortfall of qualified, well-versed academic staff today, while the number of Ph.Ds joining the pool is very small. For example, India produces just about a 100 Ph.Ds in Computer Science today. With globalization, the Indian educational institutions have to achieve higher benchmarks to maintain relevance. This explains the sprouting of new higher educational institutions like the new IITs,IIITs, IISER, and others trying to match them. These have to be manned by qualified faculty. So, we need to have more students pursuing Phds.
- Yet, we don't see too many people pursuing doctorates in India. Why? One, there is no monetary benefit for the long struggle. But that will always be the cost of pursuing anything different, hence that will never deter the really committed. Secondly, there is government apathy of which the zillions of pages have already been written. More importantly, we are not contextualizing and localizing the problems we are solving. We are solving problems defined and relevant to the West, hence neither the potential candidates nor the Indian society at large feels any affinity to the kind of problems tackled as part of the candidate's thesis. So, even the demand exists, the supply doesn't inspire enough confidence in the society. This chain of thought naturally leads to preference for the West by many wannabe candidates.
- Of course, the PhD syllabus needs to reformed. In a fast moving and dynamic world, the course needs to be more flexible. There could be intermediate exit points in the course, for instance.
- This seems to be part of the conservative agenda (of which the Economist is the vanguard), that wants to spend lesser and lesser on free and open education, and make the work force pay for job oriented skills. Of course, societies don't run only on markets and there should always be a place for intellectual and artistic pursuits that don't necessarily yield the market any pay-off. Society must always support such endeavours.
What Ph.D candidates need to do to weather this storm:
- Information is now ubiquitous, it is not a premium; hence, the days of the informed teacher being highly regarded are gone. However, with the deluge of data, the ability to analyze information, think deeply and synthesize ideas are needed more than ever. Hence Ph.D candidates have to focus more on developing their faculties in this direction. This is anyway part of their brief, but being satisfied with low-hanging fruits like being an authority of a subject will not work in future.
- They must not become super-specialists, limiting their thinking to some restricted domains of thought. After all, it is a doctorate of philosophy, and the spirit of philosophy is to think openly with no restrictions. Creativity depends a lot on cross pollination of ideas from many disciplines.
- There has to be an irreverence to authority and a commitment to be fiercely independent.
4 comments:
I think most of the people go for PhDs due to the value attached to the tag. With a PhD, you can hop the job ladder, you get good salaries(?) and recognition. Moreover, the topics of thesis undertaken by the PhD candidates are more questionable. Most of the guys try to do a cover up by building some one else's research work and the scale of genuine work is very small.
IMHO, one does not have to be a PhD to do research or to innovate. If India wants to thrive in the cutting edge research, they have to come up at least some infrastructure ( i believe it is there up to an extent but most people don't know about it ) along with the knack to spot innovative people and get them to do the job. http://www.nif.org.in/ is a wonderful example of spotting and grooming talent at grass root level.
My 2 paisa :P
Today, I think PhDs neither help people hop the job ladder, nor is there any appreciable difference in the salary you get. So most people atleast start off with the intention of exploring an area of research they are interested in. Now, this does not have to be aligned to what the market or society needs. Market/social utility hardly ever is a factor for an innovator. No wonder Phd students aren't paid too much - because society doesn't think it is useful in the short term. Then why should you invest in research? I heard a talk recently, where the speaker summed it up thus - building survival ability for the unknown future by expanding knowledge. And that means not be concerned about immediate utility or returns of the work. People will always find ways to use knowledge.
The success ratios are going to be low. How many startups out of all the ones that are started succeed? In research, it is going to be lower.
Yes, so the Phd programme (or the way we approach it) needs change, so that more interesting topics are taken up and the course maintains a balance between individual independence and some social responsibility.
My 2 paisa - (do aur do paanch :))
I think, at the end of day, it boils down to how to come up with new ideas that will benefit the society and the individual in near future. So either you can do a PhD and innovate OR you can put up on your own and give life to new ideas.
One simple thing that will raise the bar in PhD programs could be as simple as connecting all the Universities in India and establish a research community that can help grow this culture.
This trend eventually will give rise to interesting startups. What do you think?
The statement that 'Market/social utility hardly ever is a factor for an innovator' is frankly not true. Like you yourself mention later that 'a balance between individual independence and some social responsibility' has to exist. Well it does exist, although tenuously in some cases. Most, if not all, innovators have some vision (if only understood by them), rooted either in society and/or market, which impels them forward. People tend to associate innovation just with science and hence tend to defend scientific endeavors in such words. for e.g. democracy can be thought of as a social innovation that came by because of a compelling need to find the best way to govern. indeed, a lot of modern Western philosophy came into being because an understanding of human nature was considered a prerequisite for statecraft and organizing societies meaningfully. Then there is warfare. why, in the world, was Galileo interested in projectile motion, essentially pioneering physics? because warfare was increasingly using cannons. Oddly, even the need to justify divine providence has been a motivator for such minions like Kepler and Newton. Innovators are interest-driven citizens, not simply 'pure' scientific individuals.
Market can and does corrode societal objectives of the scientists, but thats a different debate. Necessity remains, thankfully, the mother of invention. and innovators and scientists need to keep that in mind when they explain their work to the society at large.
Post a Comment