mojtaba gholipour

This article proceeds in three steps: First, we attempt to show within a conceptual-theoretical framework that development in our era, the information age, has found a new dominant mode, which is called the Informational Mode of Development. While explaining this new mode of development, we attempt to show the driving role of this type of development to other aspects of development, such as economic development and human development. In the second step, by presenting a very concise picture of Iran's situation in some key indicators of information development, we show that despite the availability of conditions, Iran has not been able to provide the infrastructure and grounds required for informational development and the blessings that come from it, due to the defective way of dealing with ICTs and emerging technological phenomena on the one hand and neglect of the field of education and knowledge in recent years on the other. In the third step, we present a very concise analysis of the obstacles to informational development in Iran. Then in the conclusion section, we will point out some strategic imperatives for development within the framework of the informational mode of development.Our conceptualization of the informational mode of development and informational development is largely indebted to Manuel Castells, Pekka Himanen and their colleagues in the book "Reconceptualizing Development in the Global Information Age"; However, we will use the discussions of people such as Klaus Schwab, William Brian Arthur and his discussion on "Economic Evolution Following Technological Evolution" and the findings of various researchers for further explanation.

In the theoretical and conceptual part of the article, we rely on the meta-synthesis of existing research literature in this field. To measure Iran's status in the fundamental indicators of informational development, we use documentary studies and secondary data from existing global reports.

Today, the competitiveness of territories and companies depends largely on their ability to follow the rules of the information economy. Research literature in this field shows a positive and synergistic relationship between informationalism and the productivity and competitiveness of countries, regions and companies. The realization of this synergistic relationship is conditional on the existence of three factors; factors that can be considered the three fundamental aspects of informationdevelopment:Adequate and optimal infrastructure in ICTs (technology diffusion)Organizational transformation in the form of networking (for example, networked enterprise and e-governmentIncreasing the quality of the human workforce, which depends on education and quality of life.Accordingly, a country that wants to benefit from the blessings and advantages of information development in today's world must first have strong, extensiveand comprehensive ICT infrastructures and constantly update and strengthen them at the level ofthe most developed countries in the world; second, companies and organizations in that country (both private and public, including the government itself) must be managed in a networked manner and also have strong links with global financial and commercial exchange networks; and third, there must be a knowledge-based and capable human resource to support this entire ecosystem of informational development. Emphasis on infrastructure and technical dimensions and neglect of network dimensions, especially human and knowledge dimensions, will cause the information development cycle to remain incomplete and unstable. Even if economic growth is achieved in the short term, the country may move away from holistic development due to increasing inequalities, poverty, and the digital-income gap.This is while Iran's situation in global indicators related to the development and application of ICT is improving slowly overall, but it is clearly lagging behind the leading countries of the world and all the rich and stable countries of the region and is in some cases regressing. Even where growth is observed, the growth rate is so slow and the growth process is so steep that it seems as if the country has no intention of competing and excelling in regional and international competition. In addition, even the current technological infrastructure has not been optimally used to network the government and society and improve the quality of governance. The unfavorable trend of indicators related to human capital is also alarming and may challenge one of the important aspects of the country's informational development in the near future.

Reliable statistics and documents indicate that informational development in today's world is related to economic growth, productivity growth, poverty and inequality reduction, job creation, overcoming climate change and environmental degradation, and even administrative and political efficiency and the quality of governance. The capacity to produce wealth has never been as dependent on the intensity of informationalism as it is in our time, but informational development is not only the main driver of economic development, but it has also found a close relationship with human development. The fundamental and contextual role of ICTs for the emerging technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution indicates that this situation will intensify in the future.Therefore, if Iran wants to have a central position in the structure of power and wealth of the world today and in the future, it is bound to make major decisions and strategic choices to rethink its approach to emerging information and communication technologies on the one hand and to make urgent efforts to facilitate the country's macro-environment of informational development on the other. The future of the country's development in the current development paradigm depends to a large extent on the level of acceptance and support for the informational mode of development and the level of provision of platforms for its leapfrog growth. In Iran, however, the prerequisite for any policy and strategy in this area will be a change in the dominant intellectual framework and approach to new ICTs.

Government-funded universities play a central role in national research and development (R&D). However, due to the government's budget constraints, the optimal allocation of public resources has become very important. In this study, a decision support framework was developed for the optimal and robust allocation of the R&D budget to maximize the direct and uncertain outputs of R&D activities in universities. The experiments were designed in two phases. In the first phase, without considering the uncertainty of R&D outputs of universities, the optimal budget allocation was determined according to three scenarios for each university. By changing the model parameters (robustness cost control parameter and output uncertainty control parameter), the optimal budget allocation plan in uncertain and robust conditions was calculated for 12 scenarios. The analysis of data using descriptive statistics methods and the comparison of results showed that in the current situation, there was no clear correlation between R&D outputs and the R&D budget allocated to the universities, and the budget allocation process was very volatile and lacked a clear increasing or decreasing pattern. While the R&D budget that was calculated in a robust optimal way showed a logical and proportional trend to the R&D activities’ output. Also, the optimal model distributed the total available budget for the universities in such a way as to achieve the maximum performance in the total budget ceiling. Implementing the model for 5 universities in 6 consecutive years improved the output from a minimum of 2 to a maximum of 6% and saved the allocated budget from 0.1 to 1.1%.