Iran Becomes a leader in scientific diplomacy in the world
The development of international scientific partnerships and scientific diplomacy is one of the main policies of I.R. Iran, which is also emphasized by the country's higher education system. Scientific participation is one of the policies emphasized in the comprehensive scientific map of the country.
One of the important indicators of scientific participation is the share of publishing the latest joint international scientific findings from the total scientific publications of the country. Scientific analyzes extracted from Scopus Database show that while the share of scientific diplomacy in Iranian science in 2020 has reached 31% so far, the comparison of the share of participation in 2018 and 2019 shows that Iran has become a world leader in scientific diplomacy with 14% growth.
Expanding active, constructive and inspiring cooperation and interaction in science and technology (as a field of science) with other countries is one of the general policies of science and technology announced by the Supreme Leader. Scientific participation paves the way for scientific diplomacy. A research can be the result of the activity of one researcher or the scientific participation of several researchers from one country or more than one country. If two or more researchers from different countries work on a joint research project, then an international scientific interaction has taken place, often with the aim of expanding the frontiers of knowledge. This interaction can take place between several researchers from several countries or several universities or research or industrial institutes. Scientific and ethical trust is the most important element that is formed between researchers over time and opens the space for further joint research. The impact will be significant when these scientific interactions take place on a large scale between researchers in two or more countries in the long run. These interactions at a higher level than the researcher include interactions between institutions and universities of two or more countries, which are considered as a constant research partner of each other.
Studies show that the amount of scientific contributions of researchers in Iran in comparison with the world has increased from 17% in 2011 to 31% in 2020 in the last 10 years, and especially in the last 5 years has been constantly increasing. In 2016, the share of articles with international participation in total science production was 20%, which in 2017 reached 22%, in 2018 24%, in 2019 27% and in 2020 31%.
