"American scientist in France", "Expat academic France", and other such keywords.
I came across very few that were relevant to what I had in mind (although the French consulate in the US has some great resources, there are organizations helping to expand our horizons by recruiting professors to developing nations, and a few spattered stories about academic life beyond anglophone cultures, such as this one in The Guardian).
The Innovation Economy
What I did find, however, were some recent articles discussing - essentially - the so-called 'brain drain' of American scientists "considering moving overseas" due to "funding woes" in the US, pointing out congress' Sequestration disaster in particular. These articles (one in Huffington Post and another in Forbes) warn of the consequences of the US' "increasingly anti-science behaviors" and the steady trend of ever-decreasing domestic funding opportunities, as our top minds consider seeking a more productive environment abroad, "taking the innovation economy with them".
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These articles are based a report (Unlimited Potential, Vanishing Opportunity, which appears to have vanished from the web in the past week) of an online survey of 3700 scientists, and the only thing more damning than the factual content they entered was their opinions. Of the scientists surveyed, 85% believed that the cuts to research have made it possible for global competitors to catch up in "the race to discovery". As David Ng, one of the readers of the Forbes article commented, "Yup. I’m from Singapore and I know a couple government administrators who were laughing their heads off when the Bush administration bowed their heads to religious pressure and starved stem cell research of funding. They made it all too easy to poach qualified scientists from the US of A."
Economies that do not invest in education and research are economies in crisis mode, not economies with a future. Creative research drives innovation, and that cannot generally happen in a system dependent on consumer profits and relatively quick turnaround on investments. And if you don't teach your kids about the wheel, their major life accomplishment will likely be re-inventing it.
American Narcissism
Whether it's an innate feeling of superiority or national pride, a sense of entitlement to respect earned from past achievements, or the misconception that English is the language of science because we are the center of its focus, these articles imply the sort of American narcissism that you might hear spoken in the U.S. news media: "...and this is why America is slipping behind in being 'the greatest country on the planet'."
This attitude invokes the erroneous image that science is confined by national borders. As if there are no other reasons for American scientists to seek employment beyond "the land of opportunity".
"A visit to a well-regarded and well-funded lab in a foreign country, however, can easily demonstrate that the “mainstream” flows beyond the borders of the United States." - Amy Gladfelter (Cell Biol Educ 2002)
For those of you who aren't scientists, or those few scientists who don't have international colleagues, I have a newsflash: many of the great minds at the forefront of their respective disciplines speak English as a second, third, or fourth language, and may publish their work on either end of a two-hour lunch or amid the interruptions of civil conflict.
When I made the decision to move to France, I was making an academic decision. This was where the scientists I wanted to work with were based, and also where I would have greater access to my study system in the Alps. It just made sense.
In a 2002 article titled 'A lab with a view: American Postdocs Abroad', Amy Gladfelter gave her perspective about the issues surrounding why Americans are actually less inclined to go abroad for postdoctoral study than they were several decades ago. Some of those reasons include the idea that the job market is too competitive to essentially take time out to work abroad, or simple fears of language barriers and other common risks of venturing out of one's comfort zone.
It could be that my high school class theme was "A World Without Borders" (I went to a magnet (read: nerd) school, which is now 14th in the nation -shameless plug!), or that I work with pathogens and parasites that typically don't care about politics, but it really irked me that the idea of American scientists going abroad for work is likened to abandoning a sinking ship. I get that it takes this kind of rhetoric to sway public opinion, but surely there are other ways to express the problems created by the shrinking of research funds.
The CDD Problem
As bad as the funding situation may seem in the US, these articles also fail to put it in perspective.
If anything human is more globally interconnected than the scientific community, it's the economy. With maybe the exception of a few countries who were relatively buffered from the financial crisis of 2008 (such as Australia), researchers seeking funding opportunities by exercising the liberties of a US passport are not likely to find their mecca with any more success than if they had stayed put.
Funding is tight almost everywhere you look. The financial crisis in Europe had such an impact that many Spanish academics must go abroad to find work, and the position of "Researcher" no longer even exists in Italy. Don't quote me on this, but I have heard that 25% of those funded by the French National Science Organisation (CNRS) are Italian nationals. And that is not because it's easy to get funding. With only a slightly higher funding rate than in the US, the French equivalent to NSF grants (ANRs) are few and far between. Also, they are available only to those who already hold a permanent position.
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And now there is a new problem. A recent law passed by the French government requires that any government employee on a short term contract (Contrat à Durée Déterminée (CDD), which includes most post-docs) must be offered a permanent position after 6 years.
Wait, why is that a problem???
Well, the problem is two-fold. And here's why. Most research projects operate on a short contract: a grant is given to fund a project, that generally has a beginning and an end defined in the proposal. Extensions are not generally given without the researchers submitting a new proposal with some new angle or direction presented to justify the continued funding. In order to get the work done, short-term contracts are given for the duration of the project (usually 1-3 years), and these positions are filled by both post-doctoral researchers as well as technicians.
Problem 1: "800 CDD, 800 Unemployed." For post-docs, temporary contract (CDD) is a logical step on the way towards full-time permanent employment. A chance to prove and improve your skills. However, some people end up staying in this position for longer than others, and sometimes this extends into the double-digits. But as long as there is funding, there is such employment. And the longer you do it, the better you get. So if that perfect permanent position just hasn't yet come up, you have options. And in France, there are few options outside of these, since most private companies or even public school systems only hire those who have trained for those positions since high school. A PhD means very little outside of the academic (or agricultural/museum) community. So, now, that option is no longer available. After 3-4 years of post-doc (employers don't want to risk getting too close to that 6-year mark!), no matter how integral you are to the project or how much money there is sitting there, which you maybe even helped secure, to do the work, your contract is no longer renewed. And it's cumulative - you can't just move to another institution. And the chances of getting a position once you are "out of academia" become infinitely smaller.
Problem 2: Researchers are now forced to hire unexperienced first-year post-docs to replace those who have been managing entire platforms and projects for years. For technicians, whose services are usually shared and paid for via multiple grants pieced together from within the same laboratory, those positions and the expertise that comes with them are now in jeopardy. Sure, maybe they should have a more concrete job security. But it's just not how the system is set up. Job security is no doubt a big problem, but this is not the solution. All this does is interrupt -and in some cases, terminates- funded work.
Now, given there's no way this can be good for the science, and given the steady flow of demonstrations outside the main CNRS headquarters here in Montpellier, something has too give soon. So don't let this deter you. Just be aware that the science funding crisis is by no means something unique to the U.S..
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