Scholars mobility and its impact on the knowledge producers' workforce of European regions

TL;DR

This study analyzes how scientists' mobility across European regions influences regional workforce composition, highlighting the role of geographical factors in shaping international research talent flows.

Contribution

It provides a large-scale empirical analysis of scientist mobility and its effects on regional knowledge production in Europe from 2008 to 2017.

Findings

Talent pools are increasingly international.

Movements are influenced by geographical structures.

Mobility impacts regional scientific workforce composition.

Abstract

Knowledge production increasingly relies on mobility. However, its role as a mechanism for knowledge recombination and dissemination remains largely unknown. Based on 1,244,080 Web of Science publications from 1,435,729 authors that we used to construct a panel dataset, we study the impact of inter-regional publishing and scientists' mobility in fostering the workforce composition of European countries during 2008-2017. Specifically, we collect information on scientists who have published in one region and then published elsewhere, and explore some determinants of regional and international mobility. Preliminary findings suggest that while talent pools of researchers are increasingly international, their movements seem to be steered by geographical structures. Future research will investigate the impact of mobility on the regional structure of scientific fields by accounting for the appearance and disappearance of research topics over time.