Jessica Benson-Egglenton and Matthew Flinders

This blog post is based on the Evidence & Policy article, ‘Understanding the dynamics of research policy fellowships: an evaluative analysis of impacts and ecosystem effects’.

An early evaluation of a major UK policy fellowship programme reveals both promising impacts and significant challenges in bridging the research-policy divide.

This blog post is based on research evaluating the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Policy Fellows scheme (2021-2023).

In 2021, the ESRC invested £2.5 million in placing 24 academic researchers within government departments for up to 18 months. This ‘Research to Policy’ (R2P) fellowship programme aimed to inject research expertise directly into policymaking while helping academics better understand how government works. Our evaluation of this pilot programme reveals three key findings.

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