The Doctoral Representation of the Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg agrees with the statement on the Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz (WissZeitVG) of the following organizations:

• Federal Conference of Women's and Equal Opportunities Officers at Universities - bukof
• German Trade Union Confederation - DGB
• Education and Science Trade Union - GEW
• Network of Doctoral Candidates of the Helmholtz Association - Helmholtz Juniors
• Network of PhD students of the Leibniz Association - Leibniz PhD Network
• Network for Good Work in Science - NGA Wiss
• United Services Union - ver.di
• Association for New Incentives in Science - respect science

Plea for a reform of the law on fixed-term contracts

Science in Germany is in crisis. It is a crisis of wasted potential - a crisis that is being carried out at the expense of those who are largely responsible for the system: academics without a professorship. Uncertainty and fears about the future, stress and exacerbated dependency relationships characterize the everyday life of academia as a profession. Although the majority of research and teaching is now carried out by academics without a professorship, reliable employment relationships and predictable prospects are generally only provided for professors.

How productive could our science be if it fully exploited the potential of our academic staff?

Science is not least about thinking, experimenting and critical questioning. But this takes time - and can only be combined with a hectic pace and fear of the future at the expense of quality and self-exploitation. The peculiarities of the academic career path do not affect everyone equally. Power relations based on factors such as race, class, gender and abilty continue to have a formative influence on access, career paths and career opportunities in academia.

Today, the employment relationships of doctoral candidates and postdocs are predominantly governed by the German Academic Fixed-Term Contract Act (WissZeitVG). This law was amended in 2016 and the impact of this amendment on employment relationships was examined in several studies published last month. The results are sobering: there has been no trend reversal towards more permanent employment relationships, and the proportion of short-term contracts with terms of one year or less has not been sustainably reduced. Qualification periods are not nearly covered by the contract terms. The instruments for compensating for disadvantages are not having a reliable effect. The undersigned organizations are therefore convinced that a bold and fundamental reform of the law on special fixed-term contracts for academics is now necessary.

Key points for more predictability and equal opportunities for career paths in science:

1. The concept of qualification in the WissZeitVG must be narrowly defined and legally binding.
2. Employment for a doctorate can justify a fixed-term contract. We do not see any justification for other qualification objectives as grounds for fixed-term employment in this phase.
3. As a rule, entry into the postdoc phase should be associated with a permanent employment contract or at least a plannable procedure for permanent employment in academia. Employees whose work is characterized by permanent tasks must be employed in permanent positions.
4. Contract terms must correspond to the desired qualification goals. As the evaluations impressively show, this is not the case: average effective contract durations for doctoral candidates of around 20 months with an average doctoral period of 4.7 years (see Federal Report on Young Academics 2021) show that the 2016 amendment to the WissZeitVG has failed in terms of its own objectives. The average qualification periods should therefore be regularly surveyed on a subject-specific basis in order to set binding guidelines. Non-binding legal formulations are clearly not sufficient.
5. As the evaluation has shown, extensions of the maximum fixed-term period (Section 2 (1) sentences 4-6 WissZeitVG) have so far hardly led to actual contract extensions and should be redesigned as legal entitlements for employees. Extension entitlements should be available to all employees who are employed with the aim of completing a qualification.
6. The ban on collective bargaining must be lifted. Only when it comes to fixed-term contracts in science are the social partners prohibited by labor law from regulating key issues of working conditions by collective agreement. This is in blatant contradiction to the Federal Government's goal of strengthening collective bargaining autonomy, as set out in the coalition agreement.

Statement by the representatives of doctoral researchers on the planned amendment to the Act on Temporary Academic Contracts (Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz)

Dear BMBF, Minister Stark-Watzinger, On 17.03.23, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) published its key points of a draft bill to amend the Wissenschaftszeit-vertragsgesetz (WissZeitVG - German Act on Fixed-Term Contracts for Researchers).1 A number of status groups and interest groups have already expressed their views on this draft reform, but it does not include a clear position for doctoral researchers, even though they are the largest group of those affected by the WissZeitVG and a mainstay of the German science system.

Doctoral researchers not only conduct research on their own projects or in teams, they also teach, publish and administer to a considerable extent, and do so for lower pay and in 98 percent of cases in temporary positions, if they have any employment at all. We, as doctoral student representatives from all over Germany, are addressing the need for our own voice in the debate in this position paper. Our network comprises 43 local and supra-regional representatives at universities and non-university research institutions, representing around 100,000, i.e. 50 percent of all German doctoral researchers. We welcome your initiative to "improve working conditions in science" and to "adapt contract periods for doctorates to the expected duration of the doctorate".

Both goals are particularly worthy of support and we hope for their consistent implementation in concrete measures. However, we still see a need for adjustment in this implementation. The proposed minimum contract duration of three years is an improvement over the status quo, but it does not prevent chain contracts. Three years are not enough to complete a doctorate in any subject culture. According to the Federal Report on Young Academics 2021, in which you as the BMBF were involved, the general duration of a doctorate is 5.7 years on average (excluding human medicine). We demand that the WissZeitVG follow the statistics and make six years of employment the binding rule and not the exception. A subject-specific shortening of this regulation should only be possible in consensus with a doctoral student representation. In principle, we welcome the linking of the qualification goal and the duration of the time limit, but we miss consistent implementation here as well. The target regulations proposed in the draft reform do not provide any planning security for all those involved, and the patchwork of university- and state-dependent procedures that currently exists would thus continue to exist. We therefore call for the proposed durations of fixed-term contracts to be mandatory.

Unfortunately, your key issues paper does not yet ensure effective protection of doctoral researchers against exploitation. This is because international doctoral candidates in particular face existential dangers due to chain contracts: Their visas are often linked to their employment contracts. Combined with a fixed-term contract that does not cover the actual duration of the doctorate, those affected end up in precarious conditions of dependency. For all doctoral researchers, gaps in funding inhibit or interrupt independent academic work or even completely prevent continuation. The German Council of Science and Humanities rightly demands that these circumstances should not be at the expense of doctoral researchers.4 We therefore see it as your duty as the BMBF to counteract this deplorable state of affairs through good legislation.

Doctoral researchers take on indispensable tasks in teaching and academic self-administration that go beyond their work on their own research, in positions as research assistants or within the framework of teaching assignments. We see these additional tasks as enrichment, as long as they do not unduly interfere with the work on the doctorate, which unfortunately is not infrequently the case. Tasks that are independent of qualifications extend the doctoral period, but so far have not led to an extension of the minimum time limit. We therefore demand that the reformed WissZeitVG clearly define the concept of qualification and create measures to limit the additional workload. There must be a guaranteed minimum of 75 percent of paid hours for work on one's own research only. The vast majority of doctoral researchers are involuntarily employed in part-time positions.5 The positions neither reflect the workload of doctoral researchers, who usually work significantly more than the paid hours, nor does part-time employment extend the term of the appointment. The deadlines listed in the law would therefore have to refer to a full-time position and be extended proportionately for part-time positions. Otherwise, the payment of doctorates will remain unequal in terms of monthly salary and total paid research duration without justification. In order to keep Germany attractive and competitive as a science location in the long term and to prevent the not unjustly feared "brain drain", scientific careers must also become an attractive choice for young people.

PhD students are intrinsically highly motivated,6 but the unnecessary hurdles created by the system mainly sift out those who cannot afford or do not want uncertainty and dependence, and not those who would be best suited for research and teaching. We therefore welcome the announced revision of the draft reform and demand that it does justice to your claim for fundamental improvements in working conditions.

Our demands for a sustainable WissZeitVGare summarised below:

• Six years of regular employment duration instead of systematic chain contracts
• Mandatory regulations for minimum fixed-term contracts, exceptions only with consensus with the doctoral student representation
• Percentage-based corresponding extension of the fixed-term period for part-time positions
• Clear definition of the concept of qualification - Protection against additional workload independent of qualification by guaranteeing 75% of paid working time for own research

Yours sincerely

1 www.bmbf.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/de/2023/230317-wisszeitvg.pdf

2 98% of scientific employees under 35 years of age at universities are employed on a fixed-term basis, see www.buwin.de/dateien/buwin-2021.pdf pp. 29. Cf. also nacaps- datenportal.de/indikatoren/A2.html

3 "Overall, a doctorate thus takes an average of 4.7 years. If one excludes human medicine/health sciences and data outside the study area classification/other subjects, the average total duration is 5.7 years." www.buwin.de/dateien/buwin-2021.pdf p. 137.

4 www.wissenschaftsrat.de/download/2023/1196-23.pdf p. 8.

5 nacaps-datenportal.de/indikatoren/A3.html 6 nacaps-datenportal.de/indikatoren/D1.html