What is Science and Technology (S&T)

This chapter presents an evolutionary analysis, at the Portuguese and European levels, that features Higher Education centred on the University's Mission, the building and importance of National Innovation System, and related dynamics. The university should fulfil the fundamental role related with creation, preservation, and dissemination of knowledge and generate skills and key competences to respond to increasingly more complex problems in a rapidly changing environment, as well as to enable multidisciplinary approaches that are in the university's own and peculiar nature, and which is fostered by the relationships with the systems that drive the interaction with the target communities. Referring to the last quarter of the 20th century, the chapter outlines the emergence of the “Research University” in the context of the slow but progressive increase in value of Science and Technology and Research and Development, with the organization of the related National Systems in order to be able to foster innovation.