Scientific cooperation among graduate programs in the field of business in Brazil: structural evidence in four thematic areas

The evidence of the growth of cooperation between researchers and graduate programs has increased our understanding of the construction of scientific knowledge as embedded in social networks. This article analyzes the structures of cooperation among Brazilian business graduate programs in four areas: science and technology, strategy, public administration and organization studies. It departs from the assumption that different relational arrangements indicate various forms of organization, with consequences to the way knowledge is produced. Based on the analysis of 2874 articles published between 2000 and 2006, we investigate hypotheses concerning small worlds, preferential attachment, core-periphery and program centrality. The results point out the stratification of programs in terms of both the number of authors and published articles. Furthermore, they evidence that the most productive programs are those with more relationships, and that cooperation between programs is strongly correlated with productivity.