Symbolic Capital and Academic Fields: An Alternative Discourse on Journal Rankings
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0893318909335420
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  peer-reviewed

Putnam, Linda L.
Management Communication Quarterly
2009

Abstract:

During my 30 years in the academy, I have seen universities subject to increased demands for accountability. These demands from both internal and external publics translate into added attention to quality assessment. To evaluate teaching, universities measure student learning outcomes and rely on standardized scores as indicators of teaching effectiveness. To assess research productivity, departments document publications that appear in top-ranked journals and presses and track dollar amounts raised through external funding. This focus on evaluation, in turn, lends new credence to independent ranking systems that provide unbiased indices of quality. An unintended consequence of these academic norms, however, is the pattern of treating standards as objective indices rather than practical guidelines.