Academics, students and staff across Austria have been protesting over the government’s proposed plans to cut university funding by €1 billion (£860 million) over the next three years. At the same time, there have been calls for the Polish government to double R&D spending to 3% of GDP. Those at the demonstrations say that increasing funding would help science in these countries to remain competitive.
Over 28,000 people took to the streets in Vienna, Austria on 27 May in response to the government’s proposed budget cuts. There were also several other protests throughout the rest of the country the following day in Graz, Linz, Salzburg and Klagenfurt.
The current university budget for 2025–2027 is €16.5 billion. Yet estimates from the Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO) suggest that the budget for 2028–2030 should be around €18 billion to help cover the rising costs of running universities.
Marko Mihovilovic, dean of the faculty of technical chemistry at TU Wien, says that the Austrian science minister told the university in the days before the protests that the budget for the next three years would likely be €15.5 billion. ‘There is no compensation for inflation,’ he says, adding that the current situation is ‘unprecedented’.
‘This [decision] would mean a cut over this three-year period of over 10,000 lecturer positions at Austrian universities,’ he says. ‘This will have severe consequences on the performance of universities, not only in research, but in particular in education, because we are educating the talents of the future to work in industry.’
Mihovilovic explains that university spending represents about 4% of the country’s total budget. The Austrian finance minister is proposing an overall budget cut of around €5 billion over the next two years, meaning that ‘universities would contribute a significantly higher proportion [to cuts] than what we actually reflect’.
Bernhard Bayer-Skoff, a nanomaterials scientist at TU Wien, says that this was a ‘relatively drastic cut that was proposed a little bit out of the blue’. He says that while his group receives a lot of third-party funding – such as from industry or external grants – he still needs a certain amount of base funding from the university. ‘That is basically in danger,’ he adds, saying that this will limit his ability to pursue new ideas and projects.
‘Our federal budget is not in a good condition, and so cuts are important and are required,’ says Mihovilovic. Austria has been in a recession over the past few years, owing to rising energy costs as a result of the Russia–Ukraine war that have damaged the country’s manufacturing sector. ‘[But] where do you cut and don’t cause harm?’ he asks.
‘Every euro that goes into the [Austrian] academic sector actually is more or less immediately coming back as a return of investment because of the talents we bring into the system, and also from research outcomes that we contribute back on a midterm basis,’ he says.
He thinks that the proposed cuts are ‘short-sighted’ and that ‘other cuts could be implemented in this country that have a significantly lower detrimental effect in the long run’.
Austria’s student union is now asking people to sign a petition against the proposed cuts to the university budget. Bayer-Skoff says that the Austrian government is currently reevaluating the proposed decision and are expecting a decision in the autumn.
Protecting Polish science
On the same day as the protests in Vienna, thousands of Polish scientists and students conducted one of the country’s largest ever protests for science outside the parliament building in Warsaw. ‘We demand [the government] increase the amount of money that the government spends for science to 3% of [the country’s] GDP,’ says spectroscopist Katarzyna Marzec at Jagiellonian University Medical College and AGH University of Krakow.
In 2024, Poland spent 1.41% of its GDP on R&D – equating to 51.5 billion złoty (£10.5 billion). A target of 3% would see the government spend approximately 110 billion złoty.
Doubling spending for research would meet the EU’s voluntary target that was set in 2002 as part of the Lisbon Strategy, which aimed to make the EU the ‘most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world’. Equally, those who organised the protest are also calling for an increase to researchers’ salaries and better working conditions for students.
‘The biggest challenge Poland is facing right now, especially Polish chemistry, is not a lack of talent, in my opinion, but it’s a lack of sustained investment,’ says Marzec. ‘We need to remember that in order to maintain modern research infrastructure, attract international talent [and] support long-term types of research programmes, this of course needs funding.’
Marzec says lack of funding makes Poland unattractive for younger researchers. For example, she explains that a PhD student receives a monthly salary of around €850, while the minimum wage stands at over €1100. Early-career postdoctoral positions are often only paid marginally more than minimum wage. ‘How can we as Poland expect to attract and retain the most talented young chemists and scientists if financial conditions offered by academia remain so uncompetitive?’
Raising the budget to 3% of GDP would also make Poland more competitive when applying for third-party funding and grants, says Marzec. She explains that this would allow the government to invest more in the country’s National Science Centre – Poland’s main public funder of basic research. ‘It’s the fastest and most efficient way to strengthen Polish chemistry and retain scientific excellence in Poland,’ she adds.
‘Poland needs a stable, long-term national strategy for science and innovation that extends beyond individual governments,’ says Marzec. ‘Polish academia needs a long-term policy, not a political cycle.’
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