Wednesday 9 September, 9:30
Garfield Memorial Lecture: Policy applications of scientometrics: insights gained, lessons learned, progress expected
Koenraad Debackere
KU Leuven, Faculty of Business and Economics, Flemish Centre for R&D Monitoring (ECOOM)
We are honored to announce that Koenraad Debackere will deliver the Opening Keynote of the STI Conference in the form of the Garfield Memorial Lecture.
About the Lecture
The lecture will reflect on the historical and conceptual evolution of scientometrics. Initially rooted in information and library science, early scientometric applications focused on information services, such as literature alerts and mappings of the epistemic structure of scientific documents (e.g., the ISI Atlas of Science).
From the late twentieth century onward, a significant shift occurred: scientometrics increasingly became embedded in policy contexts, both evaluative and prospective. A close symbiosis between scientometrics and science policy emerged, leading to a co-evolution of tools and policy demands. Scientometric instruments began shaping science policy, while policy contexts influenced the development of scientometric methods.
In today’s digital and AI-driven era, the confluence of these perspectives takes on center stage and deserves attention. The lecture will examine these developments and reflect on their implications for the future of research evaluation and science policy.
This keynote lecture is supported by Clarivate.
About Koenraad Debackere
Koenraad Debackere is Professor of Economics and Management of Technology and Innovation at KU Leuven. He serves as Chair of the KU Leuven Association, and Executive Director of KU Leuven Research & Development. He is also a member of the Board of Governors of RWTH Aachen.
Trained in engineering, economics, and business at Ghent University and MIT, he has held visiting positions at several international universities. His research focuses on the economics of technology transfer, the economics of science, and science and innovation management and policy. Over the course of his career, he has received multiple international awards for research excellence and has played a key role in strengthening university-based innovation ecosystems and knowledge transfer initiatives.
Thursday 10 September, 9:30
Academic governance and research assessment in an age of epistemic uncertainty and geopolitical fragmentation
Sarah de Rijcke
Leiden University, Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS)
We are pleased to announce that Sarah de Rijcke, Rector Magnificus of Leiden University and professor of Science, Technology and Innovation Studies, will deliver a keynote lecture at the STI Conference.
About the Lecture
Research assessment has always been political, but the nature of these politics is evolving. In this keynote, de Rijcke will reflect on how universities are navigating a complex landscape shaped by geopolitical developments, the growing role of AI in research, and ongoing efforts to reform research assessment.
Drawing on both her research and experience in academic leadership, the lecture will examine how assessment systems shape knowledge production, epistemic cultures, and research careers. It will also address the gap between reform ambitions and their implementation in everyday academic practice.
Rather than offering a prescriptive roadmap, the keynote will explore the responsibilities involved in designing and deploying assessment systems, and reflect on how current geopolitical dynamics challenge the normative foundations of research evaluation in an open and pluralistic Europe.
This keynote lecture is supported by Digital Science.
About Sarah de Rijcke
Sarah de Rijcke is Professor of Science, Technology and Innovation Studies at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) and Rector Magnificus of Leiden University. She is a leading scholar in the social study of research evaluation, focusing on how assessment systems shape knowledge production, epistemic cultures, and research careers.
At CWTS, she has held several leadership roles, including Deputy Director and Scientific Director. She previously served as Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences before joining Leiden University’s Executive Board. She is also co-founder of the Research on Research Institute (RoRI) and holds various advisory and governance roles in international organisations at the intersection of open science, research assessment, and science policy.
Her work bridges critical inquiry into the politics of knowledge with the lived practice of academic governance.
Friday 11 September, 9:30
Six walks in the academic woods: Towards a scientometrics of the humanities
Andrea Bonaccorsi
University of Pisa
We are pleased to announce that Andrea Bonaccorsi, Professor of Economics and Management at the School of Engineering of the University of Pisa, will deliver a keynote lecture at the STI Conference.
About the Lecture
In this lecture, Bonaccorsi will explore the production and communication of knowledge in the humanities, with a particular focus on the role of books and scholarly publications. Drawing on recent bibliometric data and epistemological analysis, the presentation will address a number of key questions that remain underexplored within the STI community.
Are the humanities structurally different from STEM fields, and if so, in what ways? What role do books play in knowledge production and dissemination compared to journal articles? Do these characteristics require a different class of indicators? And are there shared epistemological grounds that can support dialogue between the humanities and STEM disciplines?
By engaging with these questions, the lecture will reflect on the implications for research evaluation and the development of more inclusive and field-sensitive indicators.
This keynote lecture is supported by Perspecti (Brepols).
About Andrea Bonaccorsi
Andrea Bonaccorsi is Professor of Economics and Management at the School of Engineering of the University of Pisa. His work has made significant contributions to the economics of science and innovation, and he is listed among the top 2% of most cited scientists worldwide.
He is the founder of the European Tertiary Education Register (ETER), now managed by the European Commission. In recent years, his research has focused on the implications of the epistemology of the social sciences and the humanities for research evaluation and science policy. He is currently involved in initiatives aimed at developing more reliable and representative data on the scientific production of the humanities.
His recent book, The Knowledge of Humanities: A Comparative Epistemology of Historiography, Literary Criticism, History of Art, and History of Architecture (Brepols, 2026), is the first in a new series dedicated to research on research in the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences.