Interview with Ulrich Teichler
08 May 2021
Our conference (“University Rankings – Reflections from Social Sciences and Humanities”) aims at examining the role of global rankings from the reflections of various disciplines (humanities, social science, and natural science). What main questions or topics has your field (higher education research) discuss over the last 5-10 years? According to you, which are the most relevant questions?
Most higher education researchers, who have addressed rankings in their research activities, have pointed out the normative biases of the popular rankings (e.g. belief that the cumulation of talents in a few institutions might increase the overall academic productivity in a country, pre-occupation with elite higher education, disregard of diversity, disregard of the tension between academic quality and societal relevance, etc.). Some scholars have explored alternative quality measures.
What areas have the proliferation of global rankings impacted at level of higher education institutions (for instance, accountability, marketing, student recruitment)?
I noted that most reports on impacts of rankings on higher education institutions have only looked at certain countries and certain sectors of the higher education system. I tried to widen the analysis and found much more diverse responses than public rumors suggest.
How have international rankings influenced or challenged the academic work, especially academics, academic faculty? What responses are academics giving to the pressure of global rankings?
Research on the academic profession shows both: On the one hand, adaptation to the power of rankings. For example, we note in some countries a decline of the number of publications, because an increasing number of academics want to publish almost exclusively in reviewed journals. On the other hand, we note signs of increasing diversity of academic views and activities. We still have no convincing answer to the often posed question: Does increased competition in higher education lead to more quality, or does it undermine creativity?
How do you see the future of international rankings? Are the pandemic and the shift to a more digitally-based education changing the rankings’ world?
I assume that the current debates on Corona and digitalization are short-term issues. In the long term, we will discuss more seriously: What are the tensions between academic quality and societal relevance? How much diversity of goals and profiles is needed in higher education? How much does higher education serve society through its elite products vs. through a growing wisdom among the majority of the population?
It is also an open question, whether professionalisation of higher education policy and management will increase: If so, interest in indicator-based information, such as ranking, will decline, and interest in more complex analyses will grow. The increased complexity of studies on employment and work of university graduates is an example of the latter.”
Professor Teichler’s keynote: “The Hidden Theoretical Underpinnings of the University Ranking Discourse”
Georgina KASZA
Dr. habil György Fábri (1964) is an habilitated associate professor (Institute of research on Adult Education and Knowledge Management, Faculty of Education and Psychology of Eötvös Loránd University), head of the Social Communication Research Group. Areas of research: university philosophy, sociology of higher education and science, science communication, social communication, church sociology. His monograph was published on the transformation of Hungarian higher education during the change of regime (1992 Wien) and on university rankings (2017 Budapest). He has edited several scientific journals, and his university courses and publications cover communication theory, university philosophy, science communication, social representation, media and social philosophy, ethics, and church sociology.
Dr. Mircea Dumitru is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Bucharest (since 2004). Rector of the University of Bucharest (since 2011). President of the European Society of Analytic Philosophy (2011 – 2014). Corresponding Fellow of the Romanian Academy (since 2014). Minister of Education and Scientific Research (July 2016 – January 2017). Visiting Professor at Beijing Normal University (2017 – 2022). President of the International Institute of Philosophy (2017 – 2020). President of Balkan Universities Association (2019 – 2020). He holds a PhD in Philosophy at Tulane University, New Orleans, USA (1998) with a topic in modal logic and philosophy of mathematics, and another PhD in Philosophy at the University of Bucharest (1998) with a topic in philosophy of language. Invited Professor at Tulsa University (USA), CUNY (USA), NYU (USA), Lyon 3, ENS Lyon, University of Helsinki, CUPL (Beijing, China), Pekin University (Beijing, China). Main area of research: philosophical logic, metaphysics, and philosophy of language. Main publications: Modality and Incompleteness (UMI, Ann Arbor, 1998); Modalitate si incompletitudine, (Paideia Publishing House, 2001, in Romanian; the book received the Mircea Florian Prize of the Romanian Academy); Logic and Philosophical Explorations (Humanitas, Bucharest, 2004, in Romanian); Words, Theories, and Things. Quine in Focus (ed.) (Pelican, 2009); Truth (ed.) (Bucharest University Publishing House, 2013); article on the Philosophy of Kit Fine, in The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, the Third Edition, Robert Audi (ed.) (Cambridge University Press, 2015), Metaphysics, Meaning, and Modality. Themes from Kit Fine (ed.) (Oxford University Press, forthcoming).
Mr. Degli Esposti is Full Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Deputy Rector Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna, Dean of Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna, Head of Service for the health and safety of people in the workplace, President of the Alma Mater Foundation and Delegate for Rankings.
Ben joined QS in 2002 and has led institutional performance insights function of QS since its emergence following the early success of the QS World University Rankings®. His team is, today, responsible for the operational management of all major QS research projects including the QS World University Rankings® and variants by region and subject. Comprising over 60 people in five international locations, the team also operate a widely adopted university rating system – QS Stars – and a range of commissioned business intelligence and strategic advisory services.Ben has travelled to over 50 countries and spoken on his research in almost 40. He has personally visited over 50 of the world’s top 100 universities amongst countless others and is a regular and sought after speaker on the conference circuit.Ben is married and has two sons; if he had any free time it would be spent reading, watching movies and skiing.
Anna Urbanovics is a PhD student at Doctoral School of Public Administration Sciences of the University of Public Service, and studies Sociology Master of Arts at the Corvinus University of Budapest. She is graduated in International Security Studies Master of Arts at the University of Public Service. She does research in Scientometrics and International Relations.
Since 1 February 2019 Minister Palkovics as Government Commissioner has been responsible for the coordination of the tasks prescribed in Act XXIV of 2016 on the promulgation of the Agreement between the Government of Hungary and the Government of the People’s Republic of China on the development, implementation and financing of the Hungarian section of the Budapest-Belgrade Railway Reconstruction Project.
He is the past President of the Health and Health Care Economics Section of the Hungarian Economics Association.
Based in Berlin, Zuzanna Gorenstein is Head of Project of the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) service project “International University Rankings” since 2019. Her work at HRK encompasses the conceptual development and implementation of targeted advisory, networking, and communication measures for German universities’ ranking officers. Before joining the HRK, Zuzanna Gorenstein herself served as ranking officer of Freie Universität Berlin.
His books on mathematical modeling of chemical, biological, and other complex systems have been published by Princeton University Press, MIT Press, Springer Publishing house. His new book RANKING: The Unwritten Rules of the Social Game We All Play was published recently by the Oxford University Press, and is already under translation for several languages.
