scholarly journals The visible hand of research performance assessment

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian Hamann
Keyword(s):  
Research Performance ◽  
Performance Assessments ◽  
Invisible Hand ◽  
Research Quality ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Market Forces ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
Research Staff ◽  
Visible Hand

Far from allowing a governance of universities by the invisible hand of market forces, research performance assessments do not just measure differences in research quality, but yield themselves visible symptoms in terms of a stratification and standardization of disciplines. The article illustrates this with a case study of UK history departments and their assessment by the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) and the Research Excellence Framework (REF), drawing on data from the three most recent assessments (RAE 2001, 2008, REF 2014). Symptoms of stratification are documented by the distribution of memberships in assessment panels, of research active staff, and of external research grants. Symptoms of a standardization are documented by the publications submitted to the assessments. The main finding is that the RAEs/REF and the selective allocation of funds they inform consecrate and reproduce a disciplinary center that, in contrast to the periphery, is well-endowed with grants and research staff, decides in panels over the quality standards of the field, and publishes a high number of articles in high-impact journals. This selectivity is oriented toward previous distributions of resources and a standardized notion of “excellence” rather than research performance.

scholarly journals The production of research elites. Research performance assessment in the United Kingdom

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian Hamann
Keyword(s):  
Research Performance ◽  
Performance Assessments ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
Research Staff ◽  
Unequal Distribution ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Research Excellence ◽  
British Research

The production of research elites yields non-intended stratification effects. The contribution illustrates this by drawing on the British Research Assessment Exercise/Research Excellence Framework. Building on data from the three most recent assessments (RAE 2001, RAE 2008, REF 2014), a field and capital theoretical framework examines the unequal distribution of symbolic, social, and economic resources via panel membership, research staff, and research funding. The distribution of these resources is correlated to RAE/REF rank groups. The contribution concludes that the elite (re )produced by research performance assessments in Britain is not (solely) based on “research excellence”, but on previous allocations of symbolic, social, and economic resources.

scholarly journals Pay Peanuts and Get Monkeys? Evidence from Academia

2008 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Glenn Boyle
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Research Performance ◽  
Research Quality ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
Unique Data ◽  
Market Opportunities ◽  
Academic Salary ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Impact

Abstract In most countries, academic pay is independent of discipline, thus ignoring differences in labor market opportunities. Using some unique data from a comprehensive research assessment exercise undertaken in one such country -- New Zealand -- this paper examines the impact of discipline-independent pay on research quality. I find that the greater the difference between the value of a discipline's outside opportunities and its New Zealand academic salary, the weaker its research performance in New Zealand universities. The latter apparently get what they pay for: disciplines in which opportunity cost is highest relative to the fixed compensation are least able to recruit high-quality researchers. Paying peanuts attracts mainly monkeys.

The Limits to Specialization: Problem Solving and Coordination in ‘Modular Networks’

2005 ◽  
Vol 26 (12) ◽  
pp. 1885-1907 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefano Brusoni
Keyword(s):  
Problem Solving ◽  
Distributed Learning ◽  
Division Of Labour ◽  
Learning Processes ◽  
Invisible Hand ◽  
Modular Products ◽  
Modular Networks ◽  
Visible Hand ◽  
Design Activities

This paper builds upon current research into the organizational implications of ‘modularity’. Advocates of modularity argue that the ‘invisible hand’ of markets is reaching activities previously controlled through the visible hand of hierarchies. This paper argues that there are cognitive limits to the extent of division of labour: what kinds of problems firms solve, and how they solve them, set limits to the extent of division of labour, irrespective of the extent of the market. This paper analyses the cognitive limits to the division of labour, relying on an in-depth case study of engineering design activities. On this basis, it explains why coordinating increasingly specialized bodies of knowledge, and increasingly distributed learning processes, requires the presence of knowledge-integrating firms even in the presence of modular products. Such firms, relying on their wide in-house scientific and technological capabilities, have the ‘authority’ to identify, propose and implement solutions to complex problems. In so doing, they coordinate networks of suppliers of both components and specialized competencies.

scholarly journals Using the H-Index to Measure Research Performance in Higher Education:  A Case Study of Library and Information Science Faculty in New Zealand and Australia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Amber Tyson
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Information Science ◽  
Web Of Science ◽  
Research Performance ◽  
Research Impact ◽  
Research Quality ◽  
Library And Information Science ◽  
Institutional Affiliation ◽  
H Index

<p>As academia increasingly turns to bibliometric tools to assess research impact, the question of which indicator provides the best measure of research quality is highly debated. Much emphasis has been placed on the value of the h-index, a new bibliometric tool proposed in 2005 which has quickly found favour in the scientific community. One of the first applications of the h-index was carried out by Kelly and Jennions (2006), who found a number of variables could influence the h-index scores of ecologists and evolutionary biologists. To test these findings, this study calculated the h-index scores of New Zealand and Australian researchers teaching in the field of library and information science (LIS). Publication and citation counts were generated using the Web of Science (WoS), where a number of limitations with using the database to calculate h-index scores were identified. We then considered the effect that gender, country of residence, institutional affiliation, and scientific age had on the h-index scores of LIS researchers in New Zealand and Australia. The study found a positive relationship between scientific age and h-index scores, indicating that the length of a scientist's career should be considered when using the h-index. However, analysis also showed that gender, country of residence, and institutional affiliation had no influence on h-index scores.</p>

scholarly journals Supporting Excellence in the Science Base: A future for research assessment -- but not as we know it?

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Mike Withnall
Keyword(s):  
Policy Research ◽  
Research Unit ◽  
Research Quality ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
Sufficient Time ◽  
University Departments ◽  
Science Base ◽  
The Cost

Richard Reece says in his Editorial (see page 3) that the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) has fulfilled its purpose of driving up research quality, and that there is no need for future exercises. The Director of the Science Policy Research Unit at Sussex University has reached a similar conclusion: after three rounds of the RAE there is little scope for further gains in efficiency within university departments and the cost of the exercise exceeds the benefits. But there will continue to be a need for some form of assessment of research. The Funding Councils are accountable for the quality of the work that they support. A lack of periodic assessment could lead to complacency and ossification, and universities established since 1992 may feel that they have not yet had sufficient time to develop top-ranking departments.

The Emergence of the Russian Mobile Telecom Market

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valery Yakubovich ◽  
Stanislav Shekshnia
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Cellular Phone ◽  
Invisible Hand ◽  
Highly Qualified ◽  
Communist State ◽  
Market Formation ◽  
Visible Hand ◽  
Mobile Telecom

This chapter features a case study of the emergence of the cellular phone industry in Moscow and St. Petersburg. These are local stories about how fragments of the old Communist state—in particular traditional telecoms and a military research lab, both of which had highly qualified engineers—mostly successfully reached out to foreign partners to jointly found six new cellular companies. These are the types of stories that Gorbachev promised but too rarely delivered. This chapter confirms the basic message of the previous chapter that “market formation” in post-Communist Russia was not the spontaneous invisible hand of Adam Smith and Friedrich Hayek but instead was the visible-hand emergence of business alliances and groups.

Case Study 2: another success

2002 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-106
Author(s):  
David Porter
Keyword(s):  
Construction Industry ◽  
Service Provider ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
The Government

I read Christine Hawley's letter (arq 6/1, p5)with sympathy and agree that the generally poor showing by architecture schools in the Research Assessment Exercise has repercussions beyond the universities. It helps reinforce the lowly position of the profession in the eyes of the government – that we are a second order service provider within the construction industry.

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