Identification and Pathology of Research Governance Framework in the Field of Social Sciences in the I.R of Iran

Research is the key to progress. Because it is one of the important foundations of any social and economic development in various fields, and the progressive quality of research management systems in some developed countries is indicative of this. Nowadays, many problems exist in the country's research system that cause paralysis and loss of vitality in the scientific community. Country's research system, especially in the field of human sciences is in certain confusion. There are duplications, waste of financial resources, human capital and time which originates from the lack of good governance in this field. Therefore, this article aims to identify and to diagnose the weaknesses of governance framework in humanities/ social science to provide the appropriate management of social science research and to take a step for devising an Islamic-Iranian model of governance research. This article uses a qualitative survey strategy. The researcher attended different organizations and institutions which are best known as the main areas of research governance. In addition to direct observation, a group of 16 experts were interviewed. After gathering data and analyzing them by using theme analysis method, the researcher formulated a conceptual framework of research governance and also analyzed its problems. The final framework has seven main parts: the whole system, inputs, governance box (as the process research system with three levels: macro, intermediate, micro), output, feedback, the research culture and environment, and research related systems. To ensure the validity of results, the researcher distributed a list of the most experts important weaknesses (with high degree of importance and frequency) in the form of a questionnaire, among 28 experts and finally they were verified by most ranked from least to the most by the experts.