The book analyzes rankings and indicators in global knowledge governance. Higher education and innovation policies have become central aspects in national economic competitiveness and are increasingly being measured by global rankings. Since the publication of the Shanghai ranking in 2003, governments and universities all over the world have been under pressure to adapt to new global competition in higher education (Hazelkorn 2011). This is part of a broader development in global comparative assessment where rankings in economic competitiveness and good governance had been published already earlier. Recently, global rankings that mainly concern national units of observation have been supplemented by regional rankings and city-level analysis. New assessment topics have emerged, with innovation being the most prominent.
While the rankings and indicators often seem to be supplementary and competing products, our analysis shows that they are closely linked ideationally and by having shared or similar data and methodology. We explore the dynamics of field development in global knowledge production (cf. DiMaggio and Powell 1983), where new indicators emerge steadily. Where do all these numbers come from? Who is measuring what, and how and for what purpose are the measurements being done? We argue that rankings and indicators are constitutive elements of global knowledge governance, defining and steering the institutions and practices of national knowledge production.
This book analyzes the evolution of global knowledge governance in prominent policy domains where rankings have been used: higher education, innovation policies, economic competitiveness, and good governance. We understand knowledge governance to be the institutional structures and processes governing and steering the production and dissemination of knowledge in society. We highlight common themes and similarities in the field development in different rankings. The global rankings have their ideational roots in the economic competitiveness that now encompasses national knowledge production and its institutions. Competitiveness currently serves as a dominant political imaginary framing global higher education, urbanization, innovation, and digitalization.
Moreover, the ideational shifts in the thinking of economic competitiveness exert an influence on the global measurements. As the competitiveness paradigm evolves toward holistic measurements that also concern institutional quality, it is also reflected in the measurements and their interlinkages. However, we also notice a move in another direction, where the field development in global measurement is starting to influence the ideas and measurements of competitiveness. The assessments of competitiveness are responsive to new topics of measurement such as higher education and innovativeness.
Global university rankings are often seen as a separate parallel development in the global rise of indicator knowledge. The emergence of the Shanghai ranking is framed as an individual event in the Chinese pursuit for excellence in higher education (Liu and Liu 2005), though its rise in the Asian context can be understood against the grand power shifts in global economy (Reinalda 2013). However, the linkage between university rankings and other global indicators and rankings is often overlooked. In this study, we observe the development of a global field of measurement that concerns knowledge governance. Rankings have become a prominent policy instrument in knowledge governance: the institutions that have traditionally been responsible for the production and management of knowledge in a society are now assessed globally by various indicators that measure the performance of higher education institutions, the innovation environment of a country or a region, and the role of knowledge in economic competitiveness and the quality of governance. University rankings increasingly provide a bridge between the global and regional measurements of competitiveness and innovation.
Our methodology is based on a qualitative content analysis of global governance indices as well as a conceptual analysis of indicators and the rhetoric of data producers (Koselleck 2004; Skinner 1969). We also provide a narrative on the changes in the field of measurement (cf. Vennesson 2008; Mahoney 2003; Rueschemeyer 2003). The empirical material we present mostly comprises public documentation of indicators (technical annexes, related reports, presentation of data, press releases, and newspaper items); though we also conducted a few background interviews.1 We analyze a broad selection of rankings in economic competitiveness, good governance, innovation policies, and higher education regarding knowledge governance. In this respect, this book also acts as an introduction to the field of global ranking and existing figures by highlighting key changes in the course of global rankings and possible future developments.
We pursue three main arguments here. First, rankings influence the policies of nations, though the mechanisms are not always readily apparent. Previous research has highlighted the emergence of global rankings that now significantly influence policy choices of nation-states (Erkkilä and Piironen 2009; Hazelkorn 2011; Löwenheim 2008). In our analysis of the mechanisms of influence, we highlight the specific nature of indicator knowledge, claims of authority in its production and credibility as well as national identity that is often evoked by the rankings. We outline a comprehensive theoretical framework to explain why rankings are so appealing and how they differ from other types of transnational policy scripts. We also provide theoretical tools for understanding the field structuration of global ranking.
Second, rankings and indicators constitute global knowledge governance. While measuring the institutional structures and processes that govern and steer the production and dissemination of knowledge in a society, the rankings also come to define the scope and attributes of knowledge governance. This renders national institutional legacies visible and makes them governable, influencing policies on national level. We therefore introduce coherence to the global knowledge governance through indicators, and extend the genealogy of global ranking beyond the field of university rankings. We sketch the ideational history of global ranking and show how indicators from various policy domains now define and steer the institutional structures of knowledge production and dissemination in society. This is a novel approach, as the general development in global ranking in knowledge governance has not been systematically analyzed.
Third, there are similar paths of development in rankings of different policy domains. Most notably, we observe the fragmentation of rankings and indicators in higher education, economic competitiveness, innovation, and good governance. This is caused by new indicator sets and actors entering the field of global ranking. It also reaches the ideational fundaments of the measurements, as the competing assessments potentially dent the coherence in conceptualizing the broad notions of excellence in higher education or competitiveness and innovation. Paradoxically, the fragmentation of rankings has further deepened the field structuration of global ranking. While the rankings are becoming more numerous and fragmented, ranking as a form of evaluation is becoming a standard tool of global comparative assessment, constantly spreading to new domains. We explore how the field of ranking in knowledge governance has developed and where it might be going.
Outline of the Book
The first two chapters of this book analyze the ideational and governmental aspects of global rankings in knowledge governance. Rankings have emerged as tools to reduce complexity in governance amid economic globalization. Rankings are influential policy instruments, creating calculable social objects that become governable. At present, different aspects of states’ knowledge production are being governed through external assessments and comparisons. We provide a theoretical framework for understanding the mechanisms of influence behind the numerical assessments that helps to explain why rankings steer the policies of sovereign states, but we also provide tools for understanding the dynamics of field development around the transnational production of numerical knowledge.
Chapters 4, 5, and 6 analyze the field development of global ranking and the policy processes behind it. We observe a fragmentation of rankings in higher education and knowledge governance through methodological and conceptual critique and politicization of rankings. The related methodological critique and changes in measurements are leading to new actors entering the field of rankings with more nuanced indicators and regional initiatives to challenge established global rankings. The emergence of global rankings can be understood as field structuration, where new actors joining the activity tend to re-enforce it, even if their motivation would be to provide alternative figures. Yet, the above fragmentation makes the ranking producers attempt to reduce complexity in policy assessment to an elusive goal. The argumentation in Chaps. 4, 5, and 6 is chronologically structured because we introduce a broad set of rankings and measurements to show how the field of ranking in knowledge governance has developed over time. This reflects the real-world development rather accurately (see Table 4.1).
In Chap. 2, we present our understanding of rankings as policy instruments. Building on new institutionalism, Foucauldian governmentality, and political sociology, the chapter outlines a theoretical framework for understanding rankings’ mechanisms of influence: What makes numbers influential? How and why do sovereign states and semi-independent institutions comply with the tacit policy feed promoted by rankings? We identify objectification as a key mechanism through which rankings are influential in transnational governance: quantification creates calculable social objects (world-class university, excellence, economic competitiveness) that become governable. Numbers allow those who make or possess the figures to grasp abstract phenomena and see their scope and limits. In some ways, statistics often ultimately come to define the scope of governing.
We highlight (de)politicization as a mechanism related to objectification. What we make statistics out of, and how and why, is a highly political choice since this constructs abstract entities upon which we can politicize, debate, and make decisions (Porter 1996). Rankings establish normative standards, identify deficiencies in governance, and create prescriptions for action (Hopwood and Miller 1994; Miller and Rose 1990; Rose 1999). But still, quantification creates an impression of simplicity, precision, objectivity, and neutrality. While the standards and virtues such as economic competitiveness, academic performance, the quality of research, or innovation seem commonsensical and easy for almost everybody to accept, the rankings, in fact, often involve controversial and particularistic choices not necessarily apparent to those who wish to make use of the numeric knowledge products (cf. Erkkilä and Piironen 2009).
Statistics are increasingly being produced in the international context for the purposes of supranational governance (Löwenheim 2008). Even though actors such as the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, or the Center for World-Class Universities at Shanghai Jiao Tong University do not pursue state-like sovereign power, their use of calculative technologies in defining issues of concern bears remarkable resemblance to historical attempts at making the modern state calculable (cf. Meyer et al. 1997; Sheehan 2006, 9). This also raises concerns over the instrumental rationality of numerical assessment that may come to create a Weberian “iron cage” (Weber 1978), limiting politics and ethics of national decision-making. The numbers have democratic implications creating the perception of a new external audience to whom national governments bear responsibilities, instead of their domestic constituencies.
Quantification can also imply governing through constitution of identities, by subjecting actors to expectations and self-governance. Thus, a ranking not only reinforces particular standards but also affects the status, position, or identity of the ranked entities. In producing imageries where s...