Studies in scientific collaboration

This essay investigates a number of the predictions of the theoretical view of scientific collaboration as a response to the professionalization of science: (1) that collaboration is most typically practiced by the scientific elite, or those who aspire to it, (2) that it increases individual research productivity, and (3) that it enhances the visibility of research to the larger scientific community. With respect to the first professionalized scientific community, that of Napolconic France, the study focusses on the research practices and careers of members of the Society of Arceuil, the Philomatic Society, and the First Class of the Institut, as they illustrate and confirm the accuracy of those predictions.