China’s universities just grabbed 8 of the top 10 spots in one worldwide science ranking – without changing a thing
Rankings influence student matriculation numbers, attract talented faculty and justify donations from wealthy donors.
- Rankings influence student matriculation numbers, attract talented faculty and justify donations from wealthy donors.
- University leaders rail against them, and some schools “withdraw” from them, but rankings are influential.
- A radical shift in the data underlying rankings is about to upend the rankings world – largely in favor of China’s position.
- China’s swift progress in science and technology, propelled by investments in research and university strength, has alarmed the United States and other nations.
Broader range of more sources
- But careful curation makes it the gold standard of academic indexing and one that journals and authors aspire to join.
- Reliance on curated databases is about to end with the introduction of rankings based on open data like that collected by OpenAlex.
- OpenAlex claims to include over 100,000 journals – of highly varying quality and editorial practices – compared with SCI’s 9,200.
Reflecting China’s research productivity
- As China has invested in education and grown its science and engineering capacity, many more people turn out scholarly articles.
- From a very small number in the 1980s, China had 2.2 million scientists and engineers by 2023, based on UNESCO data.
- China’s scholarly output of scientific and engineering articles shows a very rapid rise since the 1990s, with growth outpacing all other nations.
- Open-access publishing services have grown rapidly and offer fast publication times, but there are questions about the quality of their journals.
- Chinese researchers and their sponsoring institutions put a huge premium on publishing in international journals, even those hosted by questionable publishers.
Caroline Wagner does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.