Sustainable Development Goals in STI Policy

The movement towards sustainable patterns of development provides an impact almost on every area of humans’ life. Science, technology, and innovation field is not an exclusion; moreover, it is named among the main drivers of this process. This study examines how STI policy directs the field towards the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals through the prism of political commitment, which is often referred to as a crucial element of policy success. It poses the following research questions: What SDGs do national STI policies address? What is the level of STI policy commitment towards distinct SDGs that it targets? In order to answer them, the research relies on the methodology of content analysis and the framework for the assessment of political commitment which was specially devised for this study. Resulting from the analysis of STI policy documents of four countries – Germany, Canada, Portugal, and Ireland – it was concluded that STI policies in these countries verbally set the direction for STI actors with regard to every SDG. However, the levels of political commitment towards different SDGs and in different countries vary. This is reflected in specific conclusions and policy recommendations that are made for each case. Among the main general conclusions that are made resulting from the research there are: (1) the main generic function of the STI policy has not been disregarded since the adoption of the SDGs, namely enhancing system capabilities to produce STI results in general; (2) STI policies of the analyzed countries tend to prioritize environmental SDGs over social SDGs; (3) the most prominent focus in every case was given to the issues of renewable energy and CO2 emissions; (4) small economies with relatively small governmental R&D budgets tend to rely on partnerships a lot to deliver on SDGs.