If there is one thing postdoctoral and contract researchers should know by now, it is that if they don't look after their collective interests, no one else will. Eminent academic panels and learned societies frequently speak up on their behalf, but can come to conflicting conclusions (see attempts in recent years by various panels to address the embarrassing surplus of postdocs in the life sciences in the United States). Research funding agencies and publicly funded employers seek to set new standards, but progress in improving status and rewards is slow and, ultimately, can only come by collective coherence, sustained campaigning and learning from the examples of successful initiatives. One such initiative may therefore be worth noting.

A survey of postdoctoral researchers by Nature and the European Science Foundation indicated that the Netherlands is a good place to be a postdoc as far as laboratory conditions are concerned (see Nature 397, 640–641; 1999). But a recent meeting of postdocs at a major Dutch research institute, the Netherlands Cancer Institute (NKI), highlighted their profound frustration at their lack of research independence and poor career progress and development. The fact that postdocs took time out to collectively argue for better conditions, and that staff listened and acted, is unusual and commendable.

Some argue that the institute is simply fighting a rearguard action because of growing recruitment difficulties (see page 235). It is true that changes to employment law preventing institutes from awarding repeated contracts to an individual have strained the Dutch postdoc system and are galling to postdocs themselves. But postdocs often forget that what may seem expedient in the short term is not necessarily good in the longer term. A system of endless short-term contracts that lead nowhere may appear to offer a ‘holding position’ until a permanent job comes along, but, for most, such a system leads nowhere.

What more postdocs should be arguing for — a career structure — is just what some postdocs at the NKI asked for and are getting. Allowing postdocs independence by letting them apply for funding in their own right, and to take it with them if they move, is good for individual postdocs and good for the science. Other institutions should take up the challenge of providing for postdocs, and not simply wait until signs of discontent or serious recruitment problems develop.