Month: August 2010

Economic and Social Review back in the Social Science Citation Index

Economic and Social Review has been accepted by Thomson Reuters for re-inclusion in the Social Science Citation Index (hence Web of Science).

We should  be  indebted to the work of Niamh Brennan, Programme Manager, Research Information Systems & Services, Trinity College Library Dublin, for her work that showed the citation and publication record of the Journal, during its time in exile, to be of the international standards required by Thomson Reuters.

I personally enjoy writing, teaching and publishing on Ireland.  Work on Ireland published in the ESR was beginning to be seen as not internationally recognized. Hence we saw promotion boards in Irish Universities not counting the publication, yet it was counted in the research assessment exercise in the UK.  This creates poor incentives for scholars to work on Ireland, when in reality it provides extremely fertile ground for economic and social research.

As shown by Lucy and Barrett (2003), the ESR since 1970 has mainly published papers by those that were also publishing in the best Journals in their field, Neary, Honohan, Lane and Whelan, to name a few.  Lane and Whelan also edited the journal when it out of the Web of Science. The ESR is an important outlet for Economic and Social research on Ireland. Hopefully, the economics community will now promote it and build up its citation record to become a leading economic journal.  The researchers in Ireland are as good as those in Australia, Canada and the UK but we are seriously disadvantaged by not having top “home” journals promoted on good digital platforms such as the Web of Science.  

 

 

Well done Niamh, Editors and Contributors

 

 

Alan Barrett and Brian Lucey  (2003). “An Analysis of the Journal Article Output of Irish-based Economists, 1970 to 2001,” The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 34(2), pages 109-143

PSO levy (ctd)

My piece in yesterday’s Sunday Business Post builds on my post of last week. I also included elements of the discussion (thanks!), particularly expanding the bits on import substitution. Having studied in the Netherlands, import substitution was long ago and far away, so I would understand why the average Dutchie would be oblivious to its drawbacks. In Ireland, on the other hand, this policy was tried in living memory.

One of my recommendations is apparently already being followed up.

€25 bln is a lot of money

In case you did not know already, Lucey and Lyons wrote a reminder.

FT article on German growth

This FT article is well worth reading. It asks a question I had been idly wondering about: is German growth just a reflection of Chinese growth? If so, then the issue of whether Chinese (or more broadly, perhaps, Asian) growth can become self-sustaining, or will continue to largely depend on sales to over-indebted American households, is a question with major implications for the European economy.

Update: I have just come across this piece by David McWilliams on similar themes. I guess the hope for Germany is that their growth is based on more, ultimately, than Chinese exports to the likes of us.

Shanghai Jiao Tong University Rankings 2010

The 2010 rankings are available here, although the site is very busy.

As a semi-Dane, I am pleased to see two Danish universities in the top 100, along with a Norwegian university and a couple of Swedish ones.

TCD is in the 200-300 group, UCD in the 300-400 group.

OK, so all these rankings are to some extent silly, but at least in our field the ones repec put out are ‘order of magnitude sensible’. And given the government’s stress on the ‘knowledge economy’, and the amount of coverage the Times rankings get in Ireland, it seems worth pointing out that not all rankings show Irish universities in such a favourable light.

The Shanghai rankings have had a major influence in France, where policy makers were very shocked by how poorly French universities fared in the initial years of this index. The result was a major shake-up of the higher education sector there, with universities being given a lot more control of their budgets and hiring procedures.