A power-critique of academic rankings

Beyond managers, institutions, and positivism

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12928620
AutoresJ Welsh (0000-0002-7136-1001, autor correspondente)
Ano2021
Volume13
Fascículo1
Páginas28-42
Data de publicação2021-01-10
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoPower and Education (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1757-7438 • E-ISSN: 1757-7438
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1757743820986173
OpenAlexW3119237000
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas6
Referências citadas70

The bulk of research on academic rankings is policy-oriented, preoccupied with ‘best practices’, and seems incapable of transcending the normative discourse of ‘governance’. To understand, engage, and properly critique the operation of power in academic rankings, the rankings discourse needs to escape the gravity of ‘police science’ and embrace a properly political science of ranking. More specifically, the article identifies three pillars of the extant research from which a departure would be critically fruitful – positivism, managerialism, institutionalism – and then goes on to outline three aspects of rankings that a critical political analysis should explore, integrate, and develop into future research from the discourses of critical theory – arkhè, dispositif, and dialectik

Corporate governance · Critical realism (philosophy of perception · Critical theory · Discipline · Economics · Epistemology · Extant taxon · Institutionalism · Management · Managerialism · Normative · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Positivism · Power (physics · Realism · Social science · Sociology · Global Educational Policies and Reforms · Higher Education Governance and Development · Law · Management and Organizational Studies · Public Administration

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