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Monthly Archives: December 2024


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Bridging borders in knowledge: the internationalisation of Chinese social sciences

by Márton Demeter, Manuel Goyanes, Gergő Háló and Xin Xu

The dynamics of Chinese social sciences are shifting rapidly. As policies aim to balance domestic priorities with global integration, the interplay between China’s academic output and its international reception highlights critical challenges and opportunities. In a recent study published in Policy Reviews in Higher Education, we analyzed 8,962 publications by the top 500 most productive China-affiliated scholars in Economics, Education, and Political Science between 2016 and 2020.

Uneven impacts across disciplines

Our analysis reveals that most Chinese-authored works in these disciplines are published in Western-edited journals. Political Science publications often focus on China-specific topics, creating what may be interpreted as intellectual silos.

By contrast, Economics stands out for its significant global impact, with Chinese scholars’ publications frequently outpacing the citation rates of their Western peers. Meanwhile, Education and Political Science publications from China generally attract fewer citations compared to those from the U.S., U.K., and Germany.

Why does Economics perform so well? The field’s emphasis on data-driven, globally relevant research – addressing topics like economic policy, market dynamics, and financial crises – positions it effectively within international discourse. Substantial funding and resources further strengthen Economics’ visibility and impact.

In contrast, Education often highlights region-specific practices that may resonate less with a global audience, while Political Science is constrained by political sensitivities and limited opportunities for broad international collaboration.

Patterns of collaboration

Collaboration offers another perspective of Chinese academia’s strengths and limitations. Scholars in Economics and Education often engage in diverse partnerships, with strong connections to both Western and Asian institutions. In contrast, Political Science remains more insular, with most co-authorships occurring within mainland China. This inward focus may restrict the field’s integration into global academic conversations.

At an institutional level, hybrid collaborations – combining domestic and international partnerships – highlight China’s strategic approach to bridging local and global aspirations. However, the predominance of Western collaborators, particularly from the United States, underscores a continued reliance on established academic hubs.

The duality of “siloed internationalisation”

A significant finding of our study is the duality evident in Political Science research: while these publications often appear in international journals, their focus on China-specific issues reflects a form of “scientific nationalism”. This approach limits their global engagement, confining them to niche scholarly communities rather than positioning them as contributors to broader, international dialogues.

The “international in format but national in essence” approach underscores a broader challenge for Chinese academia. It must navigate the tension between adhering to global visibility standards while championing non-Western perspectives and priorities.

Policy and practical implications

Our findings also carry critical implications for policymakers, institutions, and global academic networks. For China, fostering more diverse collaborations – beyond traditional Western partners – can reduce overreliance on dominant paradigms and contribute to a more equitable global knowledge production system. Initiatives with an emphasis on partnerships with Asia-Pacific, Africa, and Eastern Europe, could play a key role in reshaping these dynamics.

We believe that, for the global academic community, greater inclusivity requires deliberate efforts to decenter Western paradigms. Platforms that ensure equitable participation and strategies to protect collaborations from geopolitical tensions are vital for sustaining open and impactful scientific exchange.

Looking forward

The field of Economics exemplifies how targeted investment and international integration can amplify visibility and impact. To replicate this success in Education and Political Science, expanding international collaboration and addressing thematic silos are essential. At the same time, global academic networks must also embrace diverse perspectives to ensure that voices from regions like China enrich rather than merely adapt to dominant discourses.

Importantly, in an era of geopolitical uncertainty, research can serve as a vital conduit for mutual understanding and collaboration. By prioritising equitable partnerships and sustaining global dialogue, we can work toward a more inclusive and, therefore, more resilient academic ecosystem.

Our study offers practical guidance for addressing the challenges of internationalization in Chinese social sciences, providing valuable tools for scholars, institutions, and policymakers working to advance global knowledge production.

For more details, explore our full paper:

Demeter, M, Goyanes, M. Háló, G and Xu, X (2024) ‘The Internationalisation of Chinese Social Sciences Research: Publication, Collaboration, and Citation Patterns in Economics, Education, and Political Science’ https://doi.org/10.1080/23322969.2024.2438240.

Márton Demeter is a Full Professor at the University of Public Service, Budapest at the Department of Social Communication, and he is the Head of Department for Science Strategy. He has extensively published on academic knowledge production in communication studies and beyond.

Manuel Goyanes serves as Associate Professor of Research Methods at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. His interdisciplinary work revolves around theoretically designing, and empirically testing, cutting-edge quantitative and qualitative methodological procedures to scientifically address challenging aspects of social science inquiry 

Gergő Háló, an assistant professor at the National University of Public Service Budapest, specialises in socio-critical studies of geopolitical and gender inequalities in science, academic performance, research assessment frameworks, and higher education policies.

Xin Xu is a Departmental Lecturer in Higher/Tertiary Education at the Department of Education, University of Oxford, and the deputy director of the Centre for Skills, Knowledge, and Organisational Performance (SKOPE). Her research focuses on tertiary education and the research on research.


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Institutional constraints to higher education datafication: an English case study

by Rachel Brooks

‘Intractable’ datafication?

Over recent years, both policymakers and university leaders have extolled the virtues of moving to a more metricised higher education sector: statistics about student satisfaction with their degree programme are held to improve the decision-making processes of prospective students, while data analytics are purported to help the shift to more personalised learning, for example. Moreover, academic studies have contended that datafication has become an ‘intractable’ part of higher education institutions (HEIs) across the world.

Nevertheless, our research (conducted in ten English HEIs, funded by TASO) – of data use with respect to widening participation to undergraduate ‘sandwich’ courses (where students spend a year on a work placement, typically during the third year of a four-year degree programme) – indicates that, despite the strong claims about the advantages of making more and better use of data, in this particular area of activity at least, significant constraints operate, limiting the advantages that can accrue through datafication.

Little evidence of widespread data use

Our interviewees were those responsible for sandwich course provision in their HEI. While most thought that data could offer useful insights into the effectiveness of their area of activity, there was little evidence of ‘intractable’ data use. This was for three main reasons. First, in some cases, interviewees explained that no relevant data were collected – in relation to access to sandwich courses and/or the outcomes of such courses. Second, in some HEIs, relevant data were collected but not analysed. Such evidence tends to support the contention that ‘data lakes’ are emerging, as HEIs collect more and more data that often remain untapped. Third, in other cases, appropriate data were collected and analysed, but in a very limited manner. For example, one interviewee explained how data were collected and analysed in relation to the participation of students from under-represented ethnic groups, but not with respect to any other widening participation categories. This limited form of datafication, in which only some social characteristics were datafied, was not, therefore, able to inform any action with respect to the participation of widening participation students generally. Indeed, across all ten HEIs, there was only one example of where data were used in a systematic fashion to help analyse who was accessing sandwich courses within the institution, and the extent to which they were representative of the wider student population.

Constraints on data use

Lack of institutional capacity

In explaining this absence of data use, the most commonly identified constraint was the lack of institutional capacity to collect and/or analyse appropriate data. For example, one interviewee commented that they did not have a very good data system for placements – ‘we are still quite Excel- based’. Excel spreadsheets were viewed as limited as they could not be easily shared or updated, and data were relatively hard to manipulate. This, according to the interviewee, made collection of appropriate data laborious, and systematic analysis of the data difficult. Interviewees also pointed to the limited time staff had available to analyse data that the institution had collected.

Prioritisation of ‘externally-facing’ data

Several interviewees described how ‘externally-facing data’ – i.e. that required by regulatory bodies and/or that fed into national and international league tables – was commonly prioritised, leaving little time for information officers to devote to generating and/or analysing data for internal purposes. One interviewee, for example, was unclear about what data, if any, were collected about equity gaps but believed that they were generally only pulled together for high-level reports ‘such as for the TEF’.

Institutional cultures

A further barrier to using data to analyse access to and outcomes of sandwich courses was perceived to be the wider culture of the institution, including its attitude to risk. An interviewee explained that the data collected in their institution was limited to two main variables – subject of study and fee status (home or international) – because of ‘ongoing cautiousness at the university about how some of that data is used and how it’s shared with different teams’.

In addition, many participants outlined the struggles they had faced in gaining access to relevant data, and in influencing decisions about what should be collected and what analyses should be run. Several spoke of having to ‘request’ particular analyses to be run (which could be turned down), leading to a fairly ad hoc and inefficient way of proceeding, and illustrating the relative lack of agency accorded to staff – typically occupying mid-level organisational roles – in accessing and manipulating data.

Reflections

Examining a discrete set of activities within the UK higher education sector – those relating to sandwich courses – provides a useful lens to examine quotidian practices with respect to the availability and use of data. Despite the strong emphasis on data by government bodies and HEI senior management teams, as well as the claims made about the ‘intractability’ of HEI data use in the academic literature, our research suggests that datafication is perhaps not as widespread as some have claimed. Indeed, it indicates that some areas of activity – even those linked to high profile political and institutional priorities (in this case, employability and widening participation) – have remained largely untouched by ‘intractable’ datafication, with relevant data either not being collected or, where it is collected, not being made available to staff working in pertinent areas.

As a consequence, the extent to which students from widening participation backgrounds were accessing sandwich courses – and then succeeding on them – relative to their peers typically remained invisible. While the majority of our interviewees were able to speculate on the extent of any under-representation and/or poor experience, this was typically on the basis of anecdotal evidence and their own ‘sense’ of how inequalities were played out in this area. Although reflecting on professional experience is obviously important, many inequalities may not be visible to staff (for example, if a student chooses not to talk about their neurodiversity or first-in-family status), even if they have regular contact with those eligible to take a sandwich course. Moreover, given the status often accorded to quantitative data within the senior management teams of universities, the lack of any statistical reporting about inequalities by social characteristic, as they pertain to sandwich courses, makes it highly likely that such issues will struggle to gain the attention of senior leaders. The barriers to the effective use of metrics highlighted above may thus have a direct impact on HEIs’ capacity to recognise and address inequalities.  

The research on which this blog is based was carried out with Jill Timms (University of Surrey) and is discussed in more detail in this article Institutional constraints to higher education datafication: an English case study | Higher Education

Rachel Brooks is Professor of Higher Education at the University of Oxford and current President of the British Sociological Association. She has conducted a wide range of research on the sociology of higher education; her most recent book is Constructing the Higher Education Student: perspectives from across Europe, published (open access) with Policy Press.


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Professor Farid Alatas on ‘The captive mind and anti-colonial thought’

by Ibrar Bhatt

On Monday 2 December 2024, during the online segment of the 2024 SRHE annual conference, Professor Farid Alatas delivered a thought-provoking keynote address in which he emphasised an urgent need for the decolonisation of knowledge within higher education. His lecture was titled ‘The captive mind and anti-colonial thought’ and drew from the themes of his numerous works including Sociological Theory Beyond the Canon (Alatas, 2017).

Alatas called for a broader, more inclusive framework for teaching sociological theory and the importance of doing so for contemporary higher education. For Alatas, this framework should move beyond a Eurocentric and androcentric focus of traditional curricula, and integrate framings and concepts from non-Western thinkers (including women) to establish a genuinely international perspective.

In particular, he discussed his detailed engagement with the neglected social theories of Ibn Khaldun, his efforts to develop a ‘neo-Khaldunian theory of sociology’. He also highlighted another exemplar of non-Western thought, the Filipino theorist José Rizal (see Alatas, 2009, 2017). Alatas discussed how such modes sort of non-Western social theory should be incorporated into social science textbooks and teaching curricula.

Professor Alatas further argued that continuing to rely on theories and concepts from a limited group of countries—primarily Western European and North American—imposes intellectual constraints that are both limiting and potentially harmful for higher education. Using historical examples, such as the divergent interpretations of the Crusades (viewed as religious wars from a European perspective but as colonial invasions from a Middle Eastern perspective), he illustrated how perspectives confined to the European experience often fail to account for the nuanced framing of such events in other regions. Such epistemic blind spots stress the need for higher education to embrace diverse ways of knowing that have long existed across global traditions.

Beyond critiquing Eurocentrism, Professor Alatas acknowledged the systemic challenges within institutions in the Global South, which also inhibit knowledge production. He urged for inward critical reflection within these contexts, addressing issues like resource constraints, institutional biases, racism, ethnocentrism, and the undervaluing of indigenous epistemologies through the internalisation of a ‘captive mindset’. Only by addressing these intertwined challenges, he concluded, can universities foster a more equitable and inclusive intellectual environment, and one that is more practically relevant and applicable to higher education in former colonised settings.

This keynote was a call to action for educators, researchers, and institutions to rethink and restructure the ways in which sociological and other academic canons are constructed and taught. But first, there is an important reflection that must be undertaken, and an acknowledgement, grounded in epistemic humility, that there is more to social theory than Eurocentrism.

There was not enough time to deeply engage with some of the concepts in his keynote; therefore, I hope to invite Professor Farid Alatas for an in-person conversation on these topics during his visit to the UK in 2025. Please look out for this event advertisement.

The recording of this keynote address is now available from https://youtu.be/4Cf6C9wP6Ac?list=PLZN6b5AbqH3BnyGcdvF5wLCmbQn37cFgr

Ibrar Bhatt is Senior Lecturer at the School of Social Sciences, Education & Social Work at Queen’s University Belfast (Northern Ireland). His research interests encompass applied linguistics, higher education, and digital humanities. He is also an Executive Editor for the journal ‘Teaching in Higher Education: Critical Perspective’s, and on the Editorial Board for the journal ‘Postdigital Science & Education’.

His recent books include ‘Critical Perspectives on Teaching in the Multilingual University’ (Routledge), ‘A Semiotics of Muslimness in China’ (with Cambridge University Press), and he is currently writing his next book ‘Heritage Literacy in the Lives of Chinese Muslim’, which will be published next year with Bloomsbury.

He was a member of the Governing Council of the Society for Research into Higher Education between 2018-2024, convened its Digital University Network between 2015-2022, and is currently the founding convener of the Society’s Multilingual University Network.

References

Alatas SF (2009) ‘Religion and reform: Two exemplars for autonomous sociology in the non-Western context’ In: Sujata P (ed) The International Handbook of Diverse Sociological Traditions London: Sage pp 29–39

Alatas SF (2017) ‘Jose Rizal (1861–1896)’ in Alatas SF and Sinha V (eds) Sociological Theory Beyond the Canon London: Palgrave Macmillan pp 143–170