School of Social and Political Sciences - Research Publications
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ItemWhat counts: Making sense of metrics of research value(Oxford University Press (OUP), 2022-06-01)Abstract There is no singular way of measuring the value of research. There are multiple criteria of evaluation given by different fields, including academia but also others, such as policy, media, and application. One measure of value within the academy is citations, while indications of wider value are now offered by altmetrics. This study investigates research value using a novel design focusing on the World Bank, which illuminates the complex relationship between valuations given by metrics and by peer review. Three theoretical categories, representing the most extreme examples of value, were identified: ‘exceptionals’, highest in both citations and altmetrics; ‘scholars’, highest in citations and lowest in altmetrics; and ‘influencers’, highest in altmetrics and lowest in citations. Qualitative analysis of 18 interviews using abstracts from each category revealed key differences in ascribed characteristics and judgements. This article provides a novel conception of research value across fields.
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ItemHybrid knowledge production and evaluation at the World Bank(Oxford University Press (OUP), 2022-12-01)Abstract Before problems can be solved, they must be defined. In global public policy, problems are defined in large part by institutions like the World Bank, whose research shapes our collective understanding of social and economic issues. This article examines how research is produced at the World Bank and deemed to be worthwhile and legitimate. Creating and capturing research on global policy problems requires organizational configurations that operate at the intersection of multiple fields. Drawing on an in-depth study of the World Bank research department, this article outlines the structures and technologies of evaluation (i.e., the measurements and procedures used in performance reviews and promotions) and the social and cultural processes (i.e., the spoken and unspoken things that matter) in producing valuable policy research. It develops a theoretically informed account of how the conditions of measurement and evaluation shape the production of knowledge at a dominant multilateral agency. In turn, it unpacks how the internal workings of organizations can shape broader epistemic infrastructures around global policy problems.
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ItemUnderstanding, measuring, and encouraging public policy research impact(Wiley, 2021)Academics undertaking public policy research are committed to tackling interesting questions driven by curiosity, but they generally also want their research to have an impact on government, service delivery, or public debate. Yet our ability to capture the impact of this research is limited because impact is under-theorised, and current systems of research impact evaluation do not allow for multiple or changing research goals. This article develops a conceptual framework for understanding, measuring, and encouraging research impact for those who seek to produce research that speaks to multiple audiences. The framework brings together message, medium, audience, engagement, impact, evaluation, and affordance within the logics of different fields. It sets out a new way of considering research goals, measurements, and incentives in an integrated way. By accounting for the logics of different fields, which encompass disciplinary, institutional, and intrinsic factors, the framework provides a new way of harnessing measurements and incentives towards fruitful learning about the contribution diverse types of public policy research can make to wider impact.
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ItemCredibility in Policy Expertise: The Function of Boundaries Between Research and Policy(WILEY, 2021-02)As science becomes an increasingly crucial resource for addressing complex challenges in society, extensive demands are placed upon the researchers who produce it. Creating valuable expert knowledge that intervenes in policy or practice requires knowledge brokers to facilitate interactions at the boundary between research and policy. Yet, existing research lacks a compelling account of the ways in which brokerage is performed to gain credibility. Drawing on mixed‐method analysis of 12 policy research settings, I outline a novel set of strategies for attaining symbolic power, whereby policy experts position themselves and others via conceptual distances drawn between the “world of ideas” and the “world of policy and practice.” Disciplinary distance works to situate research as either disciplinary or undisciplinary, epistemic distance creates a boundary between complex specialist research and direct digestible outputs, temporal distance represents the separation of slow rigorous research and agile responsive analysis, and economic distance situates research as either pure and intrinsic or marketable and fundable. I develop a theoretical account that unpacks the boundaries between research communities and shows how these boundaries permit policy research actors to achieve various strategic aims.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableStrategic positioning: How policy research actors situate their intellectual labour to gain symbolic resources from multiple fields(SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD, 2020-09)The process of knowledge production involves negotiating several social worlds, whereby actors engage in positioning and repositioning to situate their intellectual labour and gain symbolic resources. This article considers the strategic positioning of policy research actors using interview and document data. It sets out the ways in which individual and institutional actors negotiate and situate their intellectual practice in order to gain capital from a range of relevant fields. The article considers how organisations position themselves in relation to other institutions, and how individual researchers position themselves vis-a-vis their own organisations and others in the hybrid space between more established fields. It demonstrates how identities are constructed in a relational way via comparison and juxtaposition in the liminal space of international development. In doing so, it directs attention to the strategic practices involved in the production of meaningful intellectual interventions.