Assessing business schools and business scholars

Recently, Benoit and Marsh assessed the research performance of political scientists in Ireland and Ruane and Tol did the same for economists. It is business’ turn now.

There are 8 business schools in the Republic of Ireland that claim to do academic research (and another 11 that only teach). Early September, the 8 research-oriented business schools employed 543 teaching and research staff. For comparison, Queen’s U Belfast and Ulster U are also included. This makes a total of 761 business scholars.

For that reason, a simple method is used. Data were collected from Scopus only. Four statistics were gathered: year of first publication, number of publications, number of citations, and h-index. People’s name, affiliation, specialization, degree, rank, and sex were also recorded. The results are here (5 people updated).

The data have been cross-checked with CVs when online. Other than that, the data are not validated. If you are a business scholar in Ireland, please check your entries and send me an email when something is amiss.

There are preliminary results that are likely to stand up to vetting of the data.

Some 60% of business scholars in the Republic and 50%  in the North have never published in a journal included in the Scopus database. This is the most comprehensive database available, covering all the main journals and many minor ones (e.g., Economic and Social Review, Knitting International) — but not all (e.g., Irish Journal of Management, Irish Marketing Journal, Irish Marketing Review). University lecturers are partly paid to do academic research and a large number appear not to fulfill this duty — including some who are full professors. The fraction of research-active people varies dramatically between institutions, from 10% to 80%. It also varies between specializations, from 30% (accounting) to 75% (management information systems).

The life-time achievement varies substantially between business scholars. The highest number of publications is 91, the greatest number of citation is 499, and the largest h-index is 13. This indicates that the top business scholars of Ireland perform on par with the top economists and political scientists. Productivity varies too. The largest number of published papers per year is 6, the greatest number of citations is 37 per year, and the highest h-rate is 1 per year.

The top 10 (life-time achievement) consists of Paul Humphreys (UU), Rodney McAdam (UU) , Tony Brabazon (UCD), John Addison (QUB), Ronan McIvor (UU), Tom Begley (UCD), Brian Lucey (TCD), Rob Gilles (QUB), Brian Fynes (UCD) and Frank Barry (TCD). For productivity, the top 10 contains Rodney McAdam (UU), Karan Sonpar (UCD), Paul Humphreys (UU), Tony Brabazon (UCD), Maria Annunziata Liguori (QUB), Ronan McIvor (UU), Frank Figge (QUB), Brian Lucey (TCD), David Collings (UCG) and Regina Connolly (DCU). Recall that individual data still have to be vetted.

The institutions are very different too. The smallest has just 10 faculty, and the largest over 150. If we rank the institutions based on the average number of publications (per head and per active researcher), citation and h-index, and the average number of publication, citations and h-index per year, the following order emerges: TCD, UCD, QUB, UU, UCG, DCU, UL, NUIM, DIT, and NCI.

QUB ranks 19th in the 2008 RAE; UU ranks 49th out of 90 business schools. Although the RAE uses a very different methodology, this suggests that TCD and UCD are on par with the best 20 business schools in the UK, while the other business schools in the Republic are more like the worst 40.

In terms of research, most of the institutions specialize in 2-3 (out of 6) areas; UCD and UL cover 4. If these were businesses rather than business schools, one would recommend that the institutions limit their activities to their core competences. As there are horizontal economies of scale in teaching the various aspects of business, mergers would follow.

ESRI – TCD Conference: Turning Globalisation to National Advantage: Economic Policy Lessons from Ireland’s Experience

This conference will be held at the ESRI on Thursday 28th October from 13:30 to 17:30 and will discuss research results from two IRCHSS-funded projects focused on the effects of globalisation on the Irish economy and related policy responses. The conference programme can be found here. There is no attendance fee, but guests are asked to register here by the 23rd October. Any queries can be addressed to Karen Mayor (karen.mayor@esri.ie).
 

Honohan-Supported-Guarantee Talking Point Still Going Strong

Stephen Collins writes in today’s Irish Times that “Fine Gael also had the courage to support the bank guarantee which, despite the Anglo shambles, was in principle the right thing to do as the governor of the Central Bank, Patrick Honohan, has repeatedly said.”

The guarantee was perhaps the most momentous policy decision in the history of the state. Unfortunately, the standard of commentary on this decision from prominent media columnists has, in general, been pretty lamentable. Here, Mr. Collins repeats a talking point that has been rolled out repeatedly by government TDs. Well, repetition of a talking point doesn’t make it true.

As I’ve noted here and elsewhere, there is a world of difference between Honohan’s support for a guarantee and the idea that he supported the guarantee that was actually put in place.

And again contrary to a widely repeated talking point, Honohan’s primary objection to the form of the guarantee was not the inclusion of subordinated debt but rather the inclusion of almost all existing long-term bonds. He argued that this inclusion “complicated eventual loss allocation and resolution options” and that it “pre-judged that all losses in any bank becoming insolvent during the guarantee period – beyond those absorbed by some of the providers of capital – would fall on the State.” In other words, it worsened the cost of what Collins calls “the Anglo shambles.”

These comments were consistent with Honohan’s previously-expressed opinions on this issue, as shown for example in this article published in the Economic and Social Review in 2009, published a few months before he was appointed Governor.

No public indication has been given that the authorities gave serious consideration to less systemically scene-shifting – and less costly – solutions. For example, they might have provided specific state guarantees for new borrowings or injections of preference or ordinary shares – approaches that were widely adopted across Europe and the US in the following weeks.

Footnote 15, placed after the word “costly” in the above paragraph, reads as follows:

Blanket guarantees are among the “accommodating” approaches to crisis policy shown by Honohan and Klingebiel (2003) to have added considerably to the fiscal costs of banking crises around the world.

The working paper version of this 2003 publication is available here.

We also know now from the documents released by the PAC, that the form of the guarantee that was given was not recommended by the government’s own advisors Merrill Lynch, nor is there evidence that senior civil servants were recommending this approach either. So, at this point, the last refuge for those who want to argue that the government’s approach on September 30 was the right decision is this misleading Honohan-supports-it talking point.

For what it’s worth, also, I think one could argue just as strongly that it was Labour who showed more courage in objecting to the guarantee: Indeed, to this day, Labour are still getting flak from government politicians and commentators like Collins for failing to fall in line with the consensus to support the guarantee. Moreover, my understanding of Fine Gael’s position at this point is that they consider themselves to have been essentially misled by the government into supporting the guarantee.

Household waste management, episode N

The US Ambassador has again intervened in public in the row over the Poolbeg incinerator. Covanta flew some journalists to Copenhagen and they report enthusiastically about incineration there.

Covanta is concerned about the proposed (but unspecified) levies on incineration, though. They seem to accept the levies proposed by Gorecki et al and endorsed by Forfas. These levies reflect the estimated externalities of incineration, but are lower than the estimates by Eunomia. Minister Gormley, however, has proposed that levies should be unrelated to the damage caused, but should rather be set at punitive levels for undesirable technologies.

The public consultation on this has now been closed for two weeks, but the submissions have yet to be uploaded.

Exit, voice, loyalty and Ireland

I don’t agree with everything in this article, by any means, but it is thought-provoking and topical. And I definitely agree with the authors about the brilliance of Albert Hirschman.

Besides, it gives me an excuse to post a link to this piece from April.