Do institutions think? Comparing past success and future investment

We discuss whether and how past success matters in the making of current decisions about future investments in institutions. We present a longitudinal study for the case of Hungary, which indicates a negative answer. Using different comparisons (such as raw or nationally normalized values), and different indicators of excellence (such as productivity or impact) we fail to find any systematic connection between past achievements and future (i.e. later) investments in a field.