Alternative research funding mechanisms: Make funding fit for science 2.0

Funding affects how science is carried out. Over the last 50 years, the core of science funding has become competitive, project based and increasingly oriented towards societal challenges. Recently, alternative, more open and flexible funding mechanisms have emerged, such as crowdfunding, philanthropy and bottom-up mechanisms. This chapter analyses the development and implications of alternative funding mechanisms for science, through an umbrella literature review complemented by case studies. It concludes that alternative funding are an important component of research funding, which provides new opportunities especially for niche and unrecognized research, and require stronger communication skills by researchers. However, they can't and should not substitute traditional mechanisms. Researchers, institutions and funding agencies should redesign their activity accounting for a plurality of funding instruments, and facilitate collaboration between them.