ENRESSH Newsletters
N° 5 December 2018
Welcome
Professor Ioana Galleron
Welcome to the fifth ENRESSH newsletter!
Dear readers,
As many of you may know, this is my last foreword to an ENRESSH newsletter. Due to a new professional challenge, I am stepping down from my position as chair at the beginning of the new year.
My decision was not an easy one, but I was glad to think, when I took it, that by doing so I am not putting our Action in danger. ENRESSH is not a hierarchical organization, nor a simple juxtaposition of individual researchers: I am proud to say it became a real network, with multiple horizontal exchanges and agile coordination between different agendas, so as to serve our common goal, enabling the SSH to better demonstrate their true place in academia.
The recent mid-term evaluation confirms the vitality and the productivity of the network. Over the last year, a special issue of Aslib Journal of Information Management has been published on scholarly books evaluation, followed by a workshop organized in Copenhagen that opened new vistas. Our work on peer-review, ethics in SSH evaluation and gender issues is making steady progress, and no less than five joint publications are prepared within our special interest group for early career investigations. A round-table organised by our working group 2, concerning the impact of research in the SSH, has been organised during the conference “Pathways to impact”, under the auspices of the Austrian Presidency of the EU Council, and attracted numerous scholars interested by our focus on non-paradigmatic contexts and their influence on impact generation.
Unfortunately, this fruitful year has also been saddened by the tragic loss of our dear colleague and friend, Dr. Puay Tang. Please have a look at the testimonials that we are posting on our webpage to discover what a wonderful scholar and personality Puay was. Her contribution to the building of ENRESSH was decisive, and we will never express all our gratitude for her stimulating ideas and remarks.
With my season’s greeting, it is time now to send a farewell to all, ENRESSHers and stakeholders – until our paths will cross again, in some other project for the SSH.
Ioana Galleron
Chair of ENRESSH
People
ENRESSH Collaboration
Marlene Iseli & Corina Balaban
National characteristics play an important role in how individual researchers think about and practice impact.
My name is Corina Balaban. I am a post-doctoral researcher at the Manchester Institute of Innovation Research, the University of Manchester. I recently completed a short-term scientific mission (STSM) at the Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences (SAHS) in Bern, Switzerland. Marlene Iseli was my host.
Preliminary results show that characteristics of the national research context strongly relate to the ways in which people think about and behave concerning impact:
- The situation of social impact of the SSH in Switzerland was discussed comparatively to the case of the United Kingdom. By giving a presentation about the UK at the SAHS, I raised awareness about the implications of measuring and rewarding impact in certain ways. It ultimately pointed out to the responsibility of stakeholders to create – through the right funding incentives – the kind of research environment that would enable the SSH to thrive.
- From the interviews, I conclude that Swiss national characteristics play a very important role in how individuals thought about impact and how they ‘practiced’ impact. One of the ‘Swiss’ features that emerged as important in this context are the idea of ‘consensus’. This heavily influences governance and research practices, which are often bottom-up driven). Another feature is the fact that Switzerland is a direct democracy. Citizens can directly vote on a number of issues. This is identified as a potential facilitator of the relationship between science and society. However, the extent to which this applies to the SSH remains to be further explored.
The research stay had two main goals. The first is to enable an open discussion with policy-makers and stakeholders about societal impact of research in the SSH. The second is to conduct interviews with a whole range of actors involved in Swiss higher education and research. These stakeholders range from national policy-makers and stakeholders to university leaders and academics in Philosophy and Anthropology based at two universities. Switzerland was identified as a particularly good case to investigate these questions given its high performance in terms of research and innovation despite its relative lack of specific policies on research impact.
New Members
Zoe Hope Bulaitis
Introducing Zoe Hope Bulaitis
I am Zoe Hope Bulaitis, an early career researcher who explores the value of the humanities in higher education. I am particularly interested in articulating the consequences of limited, and often fiscally-oriented, research evaluation criteria.
I currently teach English Literature and Critical Theory at the University of Birmingham and the University of Wolverhampton. Previously I have completed my doctoral studies at the University of Exeter. My doctoral project entitled: “Articulations of Value in the Humanities: The Contemporary Neoliberal University and Our Victorian Inheritance” explored the historical roots of accountability and impact from the nineteenth century to the present day. I passed my viva in July 2018 (no corrections- hooray!). I am currently in the process of adapting my thesis into a book. Please see my article published in Palgrave Communications in October 2017 for a sense of this work-in-progress.
I joined ENRESSH to be part of a wider European conversation about research evaluation. My own research currently concentrates on UK policy. I wanted to learn about global challenges and initiatives. Also, given that research evaluation is such an interdisciplinary field it can sometimes be isolating to be the only scholar working on this area of debate in your school. ENRESSH offers a space to share intellectual ideas. Also, it brings together disciplines as diverse as English and Economics. This is definitely more interesting than being stuck with only your point of view and/or body of evidence!
I am currently a member of Working Group 2, because of my interest in articulating the social value of SSH research to policymakers and public bodies. I am interested in being involved in projects concerning effective value narratives, developing conceptual frameworks for advocacy, and improving the processes of governance in academia.
Please feel free to contact email me at z.bulaitis[at]bham.ac.uk or on Twitter @zoebulaitis
In memoriam: Dr Puay Tang
It is with great sadness that the chair and steering committee of ENRESSH inform you of the death of a dear MC Member and founder of ENRESSH, Dr. Puay TANG. Her untimely death came as a sudden shock to those of us who knew her and was caused by an incurable disease that was discovered at a late stage. It is very hard to accept because Puay, besides being a very fine scholar and a wonderful colleague, was such a lively personality with lots of humour.
She was involved in many projects on evaluating the impact of research, and had published extensively on the subject.
Many of you will not have met Puay, nor her partner Jordi Molas Gallart, MC Member from Spain, and yet they were both with the movement from the outset and helped set up the network that was to become ENRESSH. Puay had been unable to participate at meetings for some time due to new responsabilities at the University of Sussex, but she was always with us. She was involved in many projects on evaluating the impact of research, and had published extensively on the subject. Those who knew her will remember her joyfulness and enthusiasm. Her death is a huge loss for all of us.
ENRESSH will honour Puay’s memory on our website. If you knew her, please feel free to send us a few words saying how you met Puay, on what kind of projects you cooperated with her, or whatever other ideas you have about her. We would like to gather all these testimonials and publish them.
Please look at the Testimonial Page
Message to ENRESSH
Klaus Schuch
When addressing grand challenges and implementation of mission-oriented research, SSH can be in the driver-seat.
Dear members of the ENRESSH community!
My short note is addressed to you in my capacity as main organiser of the Austrian Presidency of the EU Council Conference on ‘Impact of Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) for a European Research Agenda – Valuation of SSH in mission-oriented research’. ENRESSH was a strategic conference partner. It contributed to the conference with a session on building strong knowledge exchange ecosystems to stimulate SSH valorisation.
The conference’s specific focus was on valuation of the diversity of SSH for transformative research agendas, in particular the forthcoming European Framework Programme “Horizon Europe”. Secondly, the conference took stock of the current endeavours in assessing impacts of SSH research.
The conference made several strong points. I can refer here subjectively to just a few:
- It is time to re-load the impact of SSH and to shift away from a defensive stance.
- Instead of talking about “integration” of SSH into dominantly technologically-minded projects, we should shift to the notion of equally valuated “contributions” of SSH to transformative research and “cooperation” with SSH at eye-level.
- When addressing grand challenges and implementation of mission-oriented research, SSH can be in the driver-seat. The challenges are grand because they concern our societies and cultures.
- There is a political economy in everything which needs to be addressed in calls launched under transformative research agendas. This is e.g. true for the political economy of climate change, or the political economy of transportation or of health research.
- The often raised differentiation between an instrumental understanding of SSH and a reflexive understanding of SSH has to be overcome in transformative research because both aspects are important.
- Innovation and value creation is not just the scope of R&D, sales and marketing, but a social process with various social implications that can be addressed by fields such as anthropology, cultural studies, education, sociology or geography.
If only some of these points become stronger in the future, then the study object of ENRESSH will increase in complexity. ENRESSH will be strongly needed to deal with the impact dimension of these upcoming issues.
Director of ZSI – Centre for Social Innovation
News
Evaluation Frameworks
Investigating the role of senior social scientists in the negotiation of the impact agenda
Impact is not perceived as a primary prescription by senior academics. Assessment processes in all countries increasingly tend to favour the publication of articles in international top journals over research outputs targeting broader audiences in local languages. Most respondents show compliance – even if symbolically – with this evolution. But, even if they do not resist to the current assessment rules, some of them manage to find their ways to society and support impact driven activities, wishing for impact to be taken more into account in evaluation.
Stimulating and fostering the impact of SSH (social sciences and humanities) research on non-academic stakeholders has become a major concern for European research policy makers. So much so that the Austrian Presidency of the EU has organized an international conference on this theme on 28 and 29 November 2018. It was the occasion for a subgroup of the Work Group 1 of the COST ENRESSH action to present some of its current work on researchers’ attitudes towards research policies.
Discussing impact often leads to analyse policies, study impact pathways or assess the validity of potential performance indicators. And all this has been duly debated during the SSH Impact Conference. We had opted though for a different – but complementary – perspective that aims at understanding the perception of senior European academics in the social sciences in regards to the rationales and criteria used to assess research and, more particularly, research impact. Through qualitative interviews conducted in eight ENRESSH countries, we investigate the role of scientists in the production, dissemination and implementation of those rationales and criteria, considering them as important drivers of change for developing further impact policies.
Relevance and Impact
It’s been a busy autumn for WG2, not least because of the new Austrian Presidency as one of the flagship conference the impact of social sciences and humanities research in Vienna in November 2018. ENRESSH were well represented here, with WG2 organising a Roundtable on Policies and structures for SSH valuation and impact. Jon Holm, Paul Benneworth, Nataša Jermen and Gemma Derrick all participated on behalf of our Action, joined by outgoing EASSH President Poul Holm and Croatian Education Ministry representative Slaven Mihaljević. The roundtable stimulated an animated discussion from the floor, with panellists and audience emphasising the need for effective communications between researchers and users translating SSH research into societal impact.
Impact Winter School Follow-up
PosterSession at the Winter School in Zagreb
Marta Wróblewska, Sergio Manrique Garzón and Bradley Good won the 1stplace in the poster award of the Pathways for Impact of SSH research in Vienna. Marta, Sergio and Bradley met during the ENRESSH Impact Winter School in Croatia earlier this year. They decided to continue their collaboration on the development of the MARIA model for multidimensional research impact (self) assessment. Congratulations!
Databases and Metrics
Book publications are not disappearing from scholarly publication profiles in the SSH
On September 10th and 11th Linda Sile, Raf Guns and Tim Engels organized a workshop at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. The topic was working with national bibliographic databases. The need for such a workshop emerged from the questions that came up during two surveys on national bibliographic databases (Sile et al 2017; Sile et al 2018). The workshop attracted 31 participants from 13 countries; a summary of the main observations from the workshop is available on the LSE Impact of Social Science blog.
The workshop also served as a preparatory event of the third training school that ENRESSH will organize October 21th to 25th in Poznan, Poland. The focus of that training school will be on databases and metrics, including the challenges and issues relating to national bibliographic databases, their capabilities in understanding SSH research as well as the emergence of metrics relevant for SSH. All suggestions and ideas about which topics should be included in the training school and what formats it should take can be send to Linda, Raf and Tim.
Meanwhile we want to bring two papers to your attention that have been made possible thanks to the ENRESSH collaboration. Under the guidance of Elea Giménez-Toledo and Jorge Manana-Rodriguez a comparative analysis of how scholarly books are taken into account in research evaluation in 19 European countries got published in Scientometrics.In ASLIB Journal of Information Management, Tim Engels and colleagues published a paper on the question whether book publications are disappearing from scholarly publication in the SSH (no they are not; cf the infographic on book chapters). We hope these papers will enhance our understanding of scholarly book publishing and will trigger more collaborative research.
SIG: Book evaluation workshop
This aim of a special issue on Scholarly Books and their Evaluation Context in the Social Sciences and Humanities is to stimulate further research concerning the “book” whereby original datasets, methods, and measures produce more informative insights for research and education policy.
For decades, scholarly monographs/edited books have been relegated to a peripheral, if not absent role in evaluation studies and procedures, although positive changes are now taking effect. In recent years we have seen an increase in quantitative as well as qualitative research activity surrounding the book — i.e., edited books, chapters, monographs, textbooks. Still, with many issues related to data access, metadata accuracy, the business of publishing, changes in publishing formats (e.g., open access; electronic publishing) and peer review standards, the evaluation community has more to learn.
Publications
ENRESSH Policy Brief
In its first policy brief, ENRESSH argues that societal impact should be evaluated in its context. Disciplinary and national differences should be acknowledged to allow for optimal communication with peers and stakeholders. Communicating with the right stakeholders in the most suitable ways is key to achieving impacts. The brief was circulated among all participants of the Pathways to Impact from SSH Research conference in Vienna (28/29 November 2018) and can be downloaded here.
ASLIB Special Issue
This aim of a special issue on Scholarly Books and their Evaluation Context in the Social Sciences and Humanities is to stimulate further research concerning the “book” whereby original datasets, methods, and measures produce more informative insights for research and education policy.
For decades, scholarly monographs/edited books have been relegated to a peripheral, if not absent role in evaluation studies and procedures, although positive changes are now taking effect. In recent years we have seen an increase in quantitative as well as qualitative research activity surrounding the book — i.e., edited books, chapters, monographs, textbooks. Still, with many issues related to data access, metadata accuracy, the business of publishing, changes in publishing formats (e.g., open access; electronic publishing) and peer review standards, the evaluation community has more to learn.
Paper on the impact criterion in the European funding arena
Researchers in the social sciences and humanities in across European countries differ in the variety of societal partners they communicate and collaborate with as well as in the variety of ways used to do so. Also, researchers differ in the ways they report about these activities. It is important for the European Commission to address these differences if it does not want its quest for impact of research to conflict with its aim for widening participation. This is what Stefan de Jong and Reetta Muhonen argue in a newly published paper in Research Evaluation: ‘Who benefits from ex ante societal impact evaluation in the European funding arena? A cross-country comparison of societal impact capacity in the social sciences and humanities’ (log in required). The paper is a direct result from Stefan’s STSM in Tampere in 2017.
Glossary
Marta Wróblewska
Academic autonomy
My classmate Dexter was what you would consider excellent scholar material: bright, diligent, modest. Brilliant in all subjects, he went on to study an Obscure and Demanding Field of the Humanities, in which he excelled.
Years passed, the most unexpected schoolmates got their PhDs, but I didn’t hear much from Dexter. And then one day I stumbled across a paper he had shared on one of the academic platforms. And what a paper it was – an expert commentary on an Important Niche of his Obscure and Demanding Field. I got in touch to congratulate him on his success.
But his news was not what I expected. After a series of disappointments in academia he decided to take on a job in industry, one which he described as repetitive and mind-numbing. Hearing this made me angry: how could academia afford to lose such people? Why did such talent have to go wasted somewhere on the peripheries of academic self-publishing? To me, the fact that Dexter continued to pursue his research goals despite being outside academia was clear proof that he deserved a place in it.
But it was only me who was angry. He was actually happy. He had a stable job that could pay the bills, the time to dedicate to his passion, a network of congenial researchers who respected his knowledge and were motivated by the same research questions. How many of us in the modern, accelerated academy can say the same thing of ourselves?
Meeting Dexter made me think about what it means to be an autonomous scholar today. While we still pay lip-service to autonomy as one of the core academic values, sometimes it is difficult to say wherein exactly it may lay in our daily hierarchy-driven, grant-fuelled, anxiety-inducing academic labour. This makes me wonder whether it is not the people we sometimes consider ‘failed academics’ – the ones who pursue intellectual work outside of the ‘knowledge factory’ – who are the truly autonomous ones?
Next Keyword
The next keyword is forthcoming
Calendar
Events
27-29 March, 2019
Annual conference of the European Association of Research Managers and Administrators
Bologna, Brussels
http://www.earmaconference.com/
5-7 June, 2019
Rome, Italy
European Forum for Studies of Policies for Research and In
https://www.euspri-forum.eu/news/news/euspri-2019-ircres.pptx
13-14 June, 2019
Tampere, Finland
Nordic STS conference 2019
https://events.uta.fi/nordicsts2019/
August 28-30
Conference on Higher Education Research (CHER) 2019
Kassel, Germany
September 19-20
Research Evaluation in the Social Sciences (RESSH) conference 2019
Valencia, Spain
October 14-17, 2019
Atlanta, GA USA
Atlanta Conference on Science and Innovation Policy