Dos décadas de financiación competitiva en España: un análisis longitudinal del principal instrumento de financiación de proyectos de investigación del Plan Nacional de I+D+i (2004-2023)

Pablo Sastrón-Toledo; Rafael Garesse; Elías Sanz-Casado

doi:10.3989/redc.2026.1.1858

Authors

Pablo Sastrón-Toledo Departamento de Biblioteconomía y Documentación, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Grupo de investigación LEMI. Instituto de Investigación Avanzada sobre Evaluación de la Ciencia y la Universidad (INAECU) https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0795-7182
Rafael Garesse Departamento de Bioquímica, Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas Sols-Morreale (UAM-CSIC) Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. Instituto de Investigación Avanzada sobre Evaluación de la Ciencia y la Universidad (INAECU) https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0338-2281
Elías Sanz-Casado Departamento de Biblioteconomía y Documentación, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Grupo de investigación LEMI. Instituto de Investigación Avanzada sobre Evaluación de la Ciencia y la Universidad (INAECU) https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0188-7489

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3989/redc.2026.1.1858

Keywords:

research funding instruments, project-based funding, public research funding

Abstract

In recent decades, the increase in research funding instruments has generated growing interest within the academic community and sparked debate about the suitability of these mechanisms for allocating resources to R&D activities. In this context, Spain has limited knowledge about the performance of its main research funding instruments. Thus, this article presents the evolution of Spains’s main public funding instrument for basic research, which allocates project-based grants to research groups affiliated with Spanish institutions. To this end, a new database is used that compiles and harmonizes information on project awards present in public documents from the State Research Agency (AEI) for the period 2004-2023. The results show a strong dependence of the funding instrument on the broader Spanish socio-economic context, as evidenced by the period following the 2008 financial crisis. The findings also point to increasing competitiveness within the instrument, as well as notable shifts in participation and success rates among different types of research actors. Lastly, the analysis highlights significant disparities across scientific disciplines, with persistent underfunding of the social sciences and humanities.

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