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The theoretical section of this paper describes three mechanisms through which science in non-Western countries is institutionalized to follow the forms that are prevalent in the major industrial nations. The empirical section, which is based on a sample of 73 less developed countries (LDCs) and underdeveloped countries (UDCs) demonstrates that the findings are inconsistent with predictions made by theories of economic development and modernization. These theories predict a positive relationship between the degree of institutionalization and economic performance, but, for LDCs we find no such relationship; for the UDCs, it is even negative. Thus we conclude that institutional isomorphism and conformity to external rational myths are loosely coupled with internal economic efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hans Selye discovered Stress in 1935 as a syndrome occurring in laboratory rats. In the modern world, Stress has become a universal explanation for human behaviour in industrial society. Selye's discovery arose out of widespread interest in the stability of bodily systems in 1930s' physiology; however, his findings were rejected by physiologists until the 1970s. This analysis is framed in terms of Latour's actor-network theories, and traces the translation of Stress from the animal laboratory into the narratives of modern life experience. This mapping reveals that translation was brought about by Selye's recruitment of a broadly based constituency outside of academic physiology, whose members each saw in Stress a validation of their pre-existing ideas of the relationship of the human mind and body in industrial civilization. While Selye was successful in realizing Stress as a scientific fact, he was unable to make his institute the obligatory passage point for Stress research. Selye's notion of a universal non-specific reaction has become accepted in almost all forms of human discourse about life and health, and physiologists in the 1990s use Stress as a unifying concept to understand the interaction of organic life with the environment. However, this modern use of Stress contains none of the physiological postulates of Selye's original findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between national scientific effort, national economic size, and national affluence is investigated. It is found that the relationship between these variables differs substantially for developed countries (DCs) and underdeveloped countries (LDCs). While affluence and economic size jointly correlate highly with levels of scientific effort in DCs, economic size alone correlates strongly with levels of scientific effort in LDCs. It is concluded that so long as LDCs remain underdeveloped economically, the prospects for their establishing strong scientific capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on some findings resulting from an explanatory analysis of the corporate tapes of the "Science Citation Index" (SCI). The analysis focuses on the international production of scientific literature, with a view of making a broad survey of national research activities. Publication counts based on the SCI were made for the scientific production of 117 countries. It was found that OECD and Eastern European countries produce 93.99 percent of the mainstream scientific literature, while third world countries produce only 4.57 per cent of this literature. The publication ranking of the world's top publication producers corresponds well with the ranking of the world's top national recipients of the Nobel prize in scientific areas. A principal components analysis of the publication data for the world's science producers for eight scientific fields suggest that there are five basic patterns for the production of national science.