The bulk of government-financed research takes place at Sweden’s universities and other higher education institutions, which sets Sweden apart in an international comparison. In Sweden today, there are 13 State-owned universities and 23 other State-owned higher education institutions (university colleges and professional schools). In addition, there are three private universities and a number of smaller higher education institutions owned by other organizations.

All universities and university colleges have permanent research resources. One reason is to give teachers at all institutions of learning the opportunity to pursue research, thereby strengthening the ties between research and higher education. Another reason is that this enables all institutions of learning to become attractive collaborative partners for the business sector and the surrounding community. Together with education and research, this kind of collaboration is one of the important major tasks of the higher education system.

In 2001 direct State appropriations comprised 47% of R&D revenue at institutions of higher education. The remaining research is externally financed. The main external financiers were national research councils, central government agencies and research foundations.

The proportion of external financing varies between different scientific fields. In engineering sciences, externally financed research work represents nearly two thirds of the total, while the humanities and law receive only one third of their research resources from external financiers. In the social sciences, medicine and natural sciences, the share of externally financed research is about 50%.

In 2001 the largest single portion of overall R&D resources at universities and other higher education institutions, 27%, went to the medical sciences. Engineering absorbed 23% of R&D resources, while natural sciences accounted for 19%. Social sciences accounted for 11% of R&D resources and research in the humanities 6%. Forestry and agricultural sciences represented 5% of total R&D resources.

Most research takes place at the universities in Lund, Uppsala, Göteborg, Stockholm, Umeå and Linköping, at the Karolinska Institute (medical research) in Stockholm, the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Chalmers University of Technology in Göteborg, Luleå Technical University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.

This text is published on this site with the approval from the Swedish Institute