In only a short period of time, the lists that rank the world’s higher education institutions have grown in number and become more influential. Rises and falls are newsworthy, and today the rankings influence both universities’ local activity and national research policy. But these attempts to measure the quality of the institutions also come in for harsh criticism.
Threats, attacks and an uncomfortable feeling that you’re being watched. All things that media and communications researcher Michael Krona has had to get used to in the past six months as a result of his increased visibility on social media. He is undertaking research into the media propaganda of the Islamic State terrorist organisation.
The demands on university teachers have increased, with additional administration and more students. The trade union, among other actors, is now calling attention to the fact that deficiencies in the system are resulting in deterioration in quality. “It is time for the institutions to speak out,” says Mats Benner, professor of research policy.
There is neither a consistent definition nor a uniform handling of misconduct in research at Swedish higher education institutions today. In many situations it is more a case of carelessness than of deliberate fraud, but the distinction is unclear. There is currently an ongoing inquiry aimed at untangling the terms and proposing concrete changes to the system.
The global scientific community shall also become a communication society without paywalls and technical barriers. This is the vision of Brian Hole, researcher and founder of the open access publishing company Ubiquity Press.
Academia is the last bastion where it is still believed that recruitment and meritocracy is gender-neutral, despite three of four professors being men. Political bodies have come much further. Drude Dahlerup, Professor of Political Science at Stockholm University, states.
People often see benefits to society when academia and industry cooperate. But can this cooperation become too close? Just how independent are researchers who are funded by industry?
Unequal societies lead to poorer health for rich and poor. More violence, less social mobility and less trust between people are also consequences of large differences in income, according to the British epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett.
There is a great pressure to publish as many items as possible in the most highly ranked journals. Sometimes the process is too fast. Forums such as Retraction Watch and Pub Peer make it possible to criticise what has already been published.
She started to do research, with an interest in understanding the question: What is information? Today Miranda Kajtazi works as an assistant professor at Lund and Örebro University and focus her research on information security. In her spare time she likes to travel.