This article addresses the issue of science and technology policies as well as its management and evaluation. Reviews the trajectory of science and technology during the last five decades of this century and analyses how science has progressively turned to the markets and to high-tech firms, simultaneously to the increase in the governmental intervention steered to integrate science and technology in the whole economy. It also analyses the notion of national innovation system and its relations with the science and technology policies. To conclude, the paper considers the problem of the limits and trends of the governmental action directed to science and technology in developing and underdeveloped countries.
Science and Technology Policies; National Innovation System; Health Research; Technological Innovation; Social and Economic Development; Science and Technology Assessment; Sustainable Development