1

Introduction

The Minerva Research Initiative is a Department of Defense (DoD) grant program whose vision is to “support social science research for a safer world” (Minerva Research Initiative, n.d.). The program funds unclassified academic social science research “aimed at improving our basic understanding of security, broadly defined.” As described further below, the program is a collaboration across several DoD units, designed to bring together leadership from different divisions to “identify and support basic social science research issues in need of attention and to integrate those research insights into the policy-making environment” (Minerva Research Initiative, n.d.). Box 1-1 summarizes the program’s objectives.

HISTORY OF THE MINERVA RESEARCH INITIATIVE AND CONTEXT FOR THE STUDY

Origins of the Program

The Minerva Research Initiative was launched in 2008 by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, motivated by the recognition that DoD was underutilizing the intellectual capital of university-based social scientists, as well as a desire to revitalize the role of social science research in informing understanding of the “social, cultural, behavioral, and political forces that shape regions of the world of strategic importance to the U.S.” (Minerva Research Initiative, n.d.) within DoD and the broader research community. In a speech, Gates urged, “we must again embrace eggheads and ideas” (Department of Defense, 2008).

There had been collaborations between DoD and academic social science researchers in the decades prior to the launch of the Minerva program, particularly during the Cold War, but these efforts had often been controversial because of concerns raised about the potential militarization of research and skepticism about whether the scholarship would be responsive to national security needs. After the September 11, 2001, attacks, interest in utilizing insights from social science research in the realm of national security reemerged.

In a speech delivered at a meeting of the Association of American Universities in 2008, Secretary Gates elaborated on his thoughts and intentions with respect to the Minerva program:

Secretary Gates’ speech did not entirely ease all concerns among social scientists, however (for some position papers, see http://essays.ssrc.org/minerva; also see National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2019a). In 2008, for example, the American Anthropological Association (AAA), representing academics in the discipline that had been at the center of the prior controversies related to collaborations with DoD, issued a letter addressed to the Office of Management and Budget. In this letter, the AAA argued that funding for Minerva grants should be routed through an agency such as the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Institutes of Health, or the National Endowment for the Humanities because of these agencies’ longer histories, relative to DoD, with funding academic research based on a well-established peer review system (Low, 2008). The AAA argued that DoD would be unable to develop a review process that would ensure the funding of rigorous academic research.

To address such concerns, DoD signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with NSF in 2008 “to support high-quality basic research in the social and behavioral sciences that has the potential for beneficial application and use in military contexts.” According to this MOU, “coordination between the agencies will include the development of solicitations and a management plan for the competition, cooperation in the selection of reviewers and advisory panel members, and cooperation in the selection of proposals to be awarded” (National Science Foundation and Department of Defense, 2008). As part of the collaboration between DoD and NSF, 18 grants were funded in 2010. Simultaneously with its negotiations with NSF, DoD also began awarding grants on a separate track. The collaboration with NSF ended after the initial round of grants because the two agencies’ differing approaches to awarding and managing grants proved too challenging to combine into one program.

In the program’s first year (2008), only one large grant was funded, focused on addressing an existing need related to terrorism. In 2009, only a small number of projects were funded, in part because the goal was to fund just a few large consortia. Starting in 2010, DoD began issuing Broad Agency Announcements (later referred to as Funding Opportunity Announcements) on grants.gov, and awareness of the program gradually increased. Grant announcements are now typically issued on an annual cycle.

Consistent with its original focus on unclassified research and scientific merit, the Minerva program is open to researchers of any nationality. Funds are awarded to the researcher’s academic institution, which must be a university either in the United States or abroad; thus, independent researchers not affiliated with an academic institution are ineligible. Because the program emphasizes capacity building and interdisciplinary research, grants are often awarded to teams of researchers, but single-investigator proposals

are also eligible for consideration. Over the years, the emphasis has shifted from very large consortia to midsized grants.

The program’s proposal process consists of two stages. In the first stage, researchers are encouraged (but not required) to submit a short version of their proposal (referred to as a white paper). Researchers whose white papers are deemed most competitive then receive an invitation to submit a full proposal.

Characteristics of the Program

Within DoD, the Minerva Research Initiative is managed by the Basic Research Office (BRO) in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD-R&E) in partnership with the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (OUSD-Policy) and the military service branches. The program’s grants are executed by and receive technical oversight from program managers from the basic research units of the service branches: the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), the Army Research Office (ARO), and the Office of Naval Research (ONR). Figure 1-1 shows the distribution of Minerva funds by source of funding. The investment in the program has been around $20–$22 million annually, with the BRO within OUSD-R&E contributing the majority of the funds. In 2016, Congress allocated additional funds to

BRO, and $10 million was used to increase funding for the Minerva program. The three service branches together have typically contributed about one-third of the funds. As of October 2018, ARO decided to withdraw from the partnership and to no longer support new awards starting with fiscal year 2019. The reasons for its withdrawal are briefly described below and discussed in further detail in Chapter 3.

Using data compiled regularly by NSF, Appendix A-1 shows federal obligations for social science research, by agency and field, while Appendix A-2 shows federal obligations for basic social science research performed at academic institutions, by agency and field. DoD was unable to confirm how the Minerva funding is reported to NSF by the service branches. The service branches have their own basic research programs, and the structure of these programs does not necessarily overlap with how NSF collects the data, which likely means that there are inconsistencies in reporting. These data are not sufficient to compare the Minerva program’s size with that of other, similar programs without making assumptions, but the program’s focus on funding academic researchers to conduct unclassified basic social science research on issues relevant to national security means that Minerva has a unique role in the funding landscape for social science research.

Figure 1-2 shows how Minerva basic research projects fit within the classification of scientific research proposed by Stokes (1997, Ch. 1). While some projects pursue basic research aimed exclusively at greater fundamental

understanding (and fall into the “Bohr quadrant” in Stokes’ framework), other projects are inspired by both the search for greater understanding and potential uses of the research (and fall into the “Pasteur quadrant”).

The Minerva program’s structure was designed to bring together DoD staff who can contribute different perspectives: research staff focused on the scientific merit of the grants (the BRO staff in OUSD-R&E and typically the service branch program managers) and policy staff focused on the policy relevance of the work (OUSD-Policy staff). There was also a practical need to utilize the contracting and project management capabilities of the service branches to administer the grants because OUSD cannot issue grants.

The committee’s interviews with DoD staff made it clear, however, that reconciling priorities across these different entities resulted in some challenges over the years with respect to funding priorities. Prior to 2017, the topics and projects to be funded were selected by OUSD-Policy in partnership with OUSD-R&E. The service branch program managers had only minor input into this part of the process, and were assigned topics and specific grants to manage on behalf of the program. This arrangement led to some discontent among the service branches, in part because the topics and methodological approaches valued in basic research are often not the ones that are clearly associated with immediate policy implications.

DoD has worked to address these challenges, and as of 2017 had expanded the role of the service branches to include all aspects of the program. Table 1-1 summarizes the changes implemented. Now, topics are initially proposed by the service branch program managers, who work with the Minerva director to ensure that Office of the Secretary of

TABLE 1-1 Comparison of the Roles of the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) and the Military Service Branches Before and After 2017

SOURCE: Montgomery (2019).

Defense (OSD) priorities are also reflected. Box 1-2 shows the topics announced for the 2018 funding cycle, and Appendix B lists all topics funded over the years. On the 2018 list, “Economic Interdependence and Security” and “Alliances and Burden-Sharing” are examples of topic areas that reflect OSD priorities, based on the National Defense Strategy. Since 2017, service branch program managers also have been taking a more active role in the white paper review process, including nominating reviewers and providing recommendations on the ranking of projects to fund. For further discussion of the processes involved in awarding and managing the Minerva grants, see Chapter 3.

Figure 1-3 shows the number of Minerva projects funded by DoD, by year. As the result of funding delays due to a variety of causes, such as the government appropriations process and the involvement of several entities in the execution of grants, the committee found that attributing a start year to a grant was not always straightforward. In 2011, for example, DoD’s funding was delayed, but some “2010 funds” were still available for use. While no awards were made in 2011, some grants started in that year.

In 2014, DoD launched a pilot program that involved diverting some of the Minerva funds to support research at Professional Military Education Institutions, such as West Point and the Air Force Academy. Those grants have since been discontinued. In 2017, a new collaboration with the U.S.

Institute of Peace was launched that provided dissertation fellowships and early-career scholar awards for research related to peace, conflict, security, and stability. These awards were not included in the committee’s evaluation.

As noted earlier, initially, the projects funded by the Minerva program were fairly large (several million dollars), and they lasted an average of 5 years. Over the years, emphasis shifted from large consortia to smaller projects, with an average budget of around $1.5 million and lasting 3 to 4 years. Figure 1-4 shows this shift in the average grant sizes.

Table 1-2 provides a more detailed look at the Minerva grant solicitations, by the year in which they were issued. Note that in some cases, the awards were announced the following calendar year. Because of logistical and contracting constraints, the solicitations have been issued by different DoD branches over time.

TABLE 1-2 Overview of the Characteristics of Minerva Grant Solicitations, by Year

NOTE: The table summarizes award information from the grant announcements. The characteristics of the grants awarded do not necessarily reflect these parameters.

CHARGE TO THE COMMITTEE

As the Minerva Research Initiative completes its first decade, DoD considers it important to look back and evaluate the program’s successes and challenges over the years. DoD would also like to determine the best path for the program going forward, consistent with its original vision, as well as the needs for basic research in the service branches and the policy focus of OSD. To that end, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine was asked to convene a committee to (1) assess the program’s impact on the scientific community and on DoD stakeholders, (2) identify emerging opportunities to improve the efficiency of the program’s administration, and (3) provide guidance on strategies for addressing the diverse needs of different constituencies so as to maximize the contribution of social science research to addressing the security challenges faced by DoD. The committee’s full statement of task is shown in Box 1-3.

The committee included experts in program review and evaluation and social scientists with broad, interdisciplinary backgrounds and experience with grants and journal publication standards in a range of disciplines. Several of the committee members also had in-depth experience with federal science-funding mechanisms.

To guide its work and help organize its thinking, the committee developed a set of research questions based on its statement of task:

• How well does Minerva operate, and how does it compare with other basic social science research programs?
• What research output has been supported by Minerva grants, and what is the quality of Minerva-supported research?
• Should and how can DoD make better use of the insights and tools/products of Minerva-supported research?
• Should and how can DoD change (1) the vision of Minerva; (2) the process for setting priorities/selecting research topics; and (3) the selection of projects to fund so as to meet contemporary, changing national security challenges, as well as the needs of each service branch, more effectively?
• Should and how can DoD increase—deepen and broaden—the engagement of social scientists in research relevant to national security?

To address its charge, the committee undertook a range of information-gathering activities, discussed in Chapter 2. Chapter 3 focuses on the processes involved in the Minerva program, including how it operates and how it compares with other similar programs that fund basic social science research. Chapter 4 provides an overview of the research supported by the program, including the quantity and quality of the outputs generated. Finally, Chapter 5 focuses on future directions for the program, including ways of broadening the use of the research and reliance on the expertise of the Minerva grantees, increasing the engagement of social scientists with the program, and any changes needed to the program’s vision and goals going forward. The committee’s recommendations are presented in Chapters 3 and 5.

Table 1-3 shows how the research questions listed above map to the committee’s statement of task and how the report is organized to address these questions.

TABLE 1-3 Minerva Program Evaluation Questions from the Statement of Task and Key Research Questions

This page intentionally left blank.