Rank Hypocrisies

Rank Hypocrisies PDF Author: Derek Sayer
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1473910633
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 129

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Book Description
"In crystalline text steeped in cold rage, Sayer takes aim at the REF’s central claim, that it is a legitimate process of expert peer review. He critiques university and national-level REF processes against actual practices of scholarly review as found in academic journals, university presses, and North American tenure procedures. His analysis is damning. If the REF fails as scholarly review, how can academics and universities continue to participate? And how can government use its rankings as a basis for public policy?" - Tarak Barkawi, London School of Economics "Sayer makes a compelling argument that the Research Excellence Framework is not only expensive and divisive, but is also deeply flawed as an evaluation exercise. Rank Hypocrisies is a rigorous and scholarly evaluation of the REF, yet written in a lively and engaging style that makes it highly readable." - Dorothy Bishop, University of Oxford Few decisions are as consequential for the funding and reputation of Britain′s universities as those of REF panels. Not only do REF rankings determine the levels of research funding universities receive from the state. They equally affect institutions′ ability to attract external grants, top-flight faculty, and graduate students. Whatever benefit the UK′s periodic research assessment exercises may have brought to research productivity, the REF has been widely criticized for its enormous costs in taxpayers′ money and academics′ time, its discouragement of innovative (and especially interdisciplinary) research, and its negative effects on collegiality and staff morale. Derek Sayer extends these arguments, notably through his discussion of the questionable staff selection processes used in REF2014 within his own university. Where Rank Hypocrisies goes beyond previous critiques is in its open challenge to the REF′s claim to provide ′expert review of the outputs′ - the very heart of its legitimacy. Examining the composition and operation of REF disciplinary subpanels in forensic detail, Sayer paints a picture in which overburdened assessors assign vaguely defined grades in fields that are frequently not their own while ignoring all external indicators of the academic influence of the publications they are appraising, and then shred all records of their deliberations. Judged against international norms of peer review, the REF is an elaborate charade - and an insult to the core values of the academy.

Rank Hypocrisies

Rank Hypocrisies PDF Author: Derek Sayer
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1473910633
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 129

Get Book Here

Book Description
"In crystalline text steeped in cold rage, Sayer takes aim at the REF’s central claim, that it is a legitimate process of expert peer review. He critiques university and national-level REF processes against actual practices of scholarly review as found in academic journals, university presses, and North American tenure procedures. His analysis is damning. If the REF fails as scholarly review, how can academics and universities continue to participate? And how can government use its rankings as a basis for public policy?" - Tarak Barkawi, London School of Economics "Sayer makes a compelling argument that the Research Excellence Framework is not only expensive and divisive, but is also deeply flawed as an evaluation exercise. Rank Hypocrisies is a rigorous and scholarly evaluation of the REF, yet written in a lively and engaging style that makes it highly readable." - Dorothy Bishop, University of Oxford Few decisions are as consequential for the funding and reputation of Britain′s universities as those of REF panels. Not only do REF rankings determine the levels of research funding universities receive from the state. They equally affect institutions′ ability to attract external grants, top-flight faculty, and graduate students. Whatever benefit the UK′s periodic research assessment exercises may have brought to research productivity, the REF has been widely criticized for its enormous costs in taxpayers′ money and academics′ time, its discouragement of innovative (and especially interdisciplinary) research, and its negative effects on collegiality and staff morale. Derek Sayer extends these arguments, notably through his discussion of the questionable staff selection processes used in REF2014 within his own university. Where Rank Hypocrisies goes beyond previous critiques is in its open challenge to the REF′s claim to provide ′expert review of the outputs′ - the very heart of its legitimacy. Examining the composition and operation of REF disciplinary subpanels in forensic detail, Sayer paints a picture in which overburdened assessors assign vaguely defined grades in fields that are frequently not their own while ignoring all external indicators of the academic influence of the publications they are appraising, and then shred all records of their deliberations. Judged against international norms of peer review, the REF is an elaborate charade - and an insult to the core values of the academy.

Decolonisation and Legal Knowledge

Decolonisation and Legal Knowledge PDF Author: Folúkẹ́ Adébísí
Publisher: Policy Press
ISBN: 1529219388
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
The law is heavily implicated in creating, maintaining, and reproducing racialised hierarchies which bring about and preserve acute global disparities and injustices. This essential book provides an examination of the meanings of decolonisation and explores how this examination can inform teaching, researching, and practising of law. It explores the ways in which the foundations of law are entangled in colonial thought and in its [re]production of ideas of commodification of bodies and space-time. Thus, it is an exploration of the ways in which we can use theories and praxes of decolonisation to produce legal knowledge for flourishing futures.

Being an Early Career Feminist Academic

Being an Early Career Feminist Academic PDF Author: Rachel Thwaites
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137543256
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
This book highlights the experiences of feminist early career researchers and teachers from an international perspective in an increasingly neoliberal academy. It offers a new angle on a significant and increasingly important discussion on the ethos of higher education and the sector's place in society. Higher education is fast-changing, increasingly market-driven, and precarious. In this context entering the academy as an early career academic presents both challenges and opportunities. Early career academics frequently face the prospect of working on fixed term contracts, with little security and no certain prospect of advancement, while constantly looking for the next role. Being a feminist academic adds a further layer of complexity: the ethos of the marketising university where students are increasingly viewed as ‘customers’ may sit uneasily with a politics of equality for all. Feminist values and practice can provide a means of working through the challenges, but may also bring complications.

The Oxford Handbook of Ethnographies of Crime and Criminal Justice

The Oxford Handbook of Ethnographies of Crime and Criminal Justice PDF Author: Sandra M. Bucerius
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019090450X
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 657

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Book Description
The Oxford Handbook of Ethnographies of Crime and Criminal Justice provides critical and current reviews of key research topics, issues, and debates that crime ethnographers have been grappling with for over a century. This volume brings together an outstanding group of scholars to discuss various research traditions, the ethical and pragmatic challenges associated with conducting crime-related fieldwork, relevant policy recommendations for practitioners in the field, and areas of future research for crime ethnographers.

From Financial Crisis to Social Change

From Financial Crisis to Social Change PDF Author: Torsten Geelan
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319706004
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 293

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Book Description
This edited collection critically engages with a range of contemporary issues in the aftermath of the North Atlantic financial crisis that began in 2007. From challenging the erosion of academic authority to the myth that parliamentary democracy is not worth engaging with, it addresses three interrelated questions facing young people today: how to reclaim our universities, how to revitalise our democracy and how to recast politics in the 21st century. This book emphasises the crucial importance of generational experience as a wellspring for progressive social change. For it is the young generations who have come of age in a world marred by crises that are at the forefront of challenging the status quo. With insight into new social movements and protests in the UK, Canada, Greece and Ukraine, this stimulating collection of works will be invaluable for those teaching, studying and campaigning for alternatives. It will also be of relevance to scholars in social movement studies, the sociology and anthropology of economic life, the sociology of education, social and political theory, and political sociology.

Liberalism in Neoliberal Times

Liberalism in Neoliberal Times PDF Author: Alejandro Abraham-Hamanoiel
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 1906897409
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 293

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Book Description
An exploration of the theories, histories, practices, and contradictions of liberalism today. What does it mean to be a liberal in neoliberal times? This collection of short essays attempts to show how liberals and the wider concept of liberalism remain relevant in what many perceive to be a highly illiberal age. Liberalism in the broader sense revolves around tolerance, progress, humanitarianism, objectivity, reason, democracy, and human rights. Liberalism's emphasis on individual rights opened a theoretical pathway to neoliberalism, through private property, a classically minimal liberal state, and the efficiency of “free markets.” In practice, neoliberalism is associated less with the economic deregulation championed by its advocates than the re-regulation of the economy to protect financial capital. Liberalism in Neoliberal Times engages with the theories, histories, practices, and contradictions of liberalism, viewing it in relation to four central areas of public life: human rights, ethnicity and gender, education, and the media. The contributors explore the transformations in as well as the transformative aspects of liberalism and highlight both its liberating and limiting capacities. The book contends that liberalism—in all its forms—continues to underpin specific institutions such as the university, the free press, the courts, and, of course, parliamentary democracy. Liberal ideas are regularly mobilized in areas such as counterterrorism, minority rights, privacy, and the pursuit of knowledge. This book contends that while we may not agree on much, we can certainly agree that an understanding of liberalism and its emancipatory capacity is simply too important to be left to the liberals Contributors Alejandro Abraham-Hamanoiel, Patrick Ainley, Abdullahi An-Na'im, Michael Bailey, Haim Bresheeth, Başak Çalı, David Chandler, William Davies, Costas Douzinas, Natalie Fenton, Des Freedman, Roberto Gargarella, Priyamvada Gopal, Jonathan Hardy, John Holmwood, Ratna Kapur, Gholam Khiabany, Ray Kiely, Monika Krause, Deepa Kumar, Arun Kundnani, Colin Leys, Howard Littler, Kathleen Lynch, Robert W. McChesney, Nivedita Menon, Toby Miller, Kate Nash, Joan Pedro-Carañana, Julian Petley, Anne Phillips, Jonathan Rosenhead, Annabelle Sreberny, John Steel, Michael Wayne, Milly Williamson

Can Markets Solve Problems?

Can Markets Solve Problems? PDF Author: Daniel Neyland
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 1912685264
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description
A provocative analysis of market-based interventions into public problems and the consequences. Market-based interventions have been used in attempts to solve numerous public problems, from education to healthcare and from climate change to privacy. Scholars have responded persuasively through critiques of neoliberalism. In Can Markets Solve Problems? Daniel Neyland, Véra Ehrenstein, and Sveta Milyaeva propose a different route forward. There is no single entity knowable as “the market,” the authors argue. Instead, they examine in detail the devices, relations, and practices that underpin these market-based interventions. Drawing on recent work in science and technology studies (STS), each chapter focuses on a different intervention and critically explores the market sensibility around which it is organized. Trade and exchange, competition, property and ownership, and investment and return all become the focus of a thorough exploration of what it means to intervene in public problems, how problems are composed, and how solutions are continually reworked. Can Markets Solve Problems? offers the first book-length STS enquiry into markets and public problems. Weaving together rich empirical descriptions and conceptual discussions, the book provides in-depth insights into the workings of these markets, their continuous evolution, and the consequences. The result is a new avenue of critical inquiry that moves between the details of specific policies and the always-emerging, collective features of this landscape of intervention.

Racism, Policy and Politics

Racism, Policy and Politics PDF Author: Karim Murji
Publisher: Policy Press
ISBN: 1447319583
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
This book analyses and bridges the gap between critical social research on race and politics by reviewing the academic field of race theorising and scholarship, covering changes in race and racism debates in recent decades, and assessing the extent, scope, and limits of academic engagements with, and impact on, policy and politics.

Return to Meaning

Return to Meaning PDF Author: Mats Alvesson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0191090778
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 173

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Book Description
This book argues that we are currently witnessing not merely a decline in the quality of social science research, but the proliferation of meaningless research, of no value to society, and modest value to its authors - apart from securing employment and promotion. The explosion of published outputs, at least in social science, creates a noisy, cluttered environment which makes meaningful research difficult, as different voices compete to capture the limelight even briefly. Older, more significant contributions are easily neglected, as the premium is to write and publish, not read and learn. The result is a widespread cynicism among academics on the value of academic research, sometimes including their own. Publishing comes to be seen as a game of hits and misses, devoid of intrinsic meaning and value, and of no wider social uses whatsoever. Academics do research in order to get published, not to say something socially meaningful. This is what we view as the rise of nonsense in academic research, which represents a serious social problem. It undermines the very point of social science. This problem is far from 'academic'. It affects many areas of social and political life entailing extensive waste of resources and inflated student fees as well as costs to tax-payers. Part two of the book offers a range of proposals aimed at restoring meaning at the heart of social research and drawing social science back address the major problems and issues that face our societies.

In Defense of Hypocrisy

In Defense of Hypocrisy PDF Author: Jeremy Lott
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
ISBN: 1418525782
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
"With verve, gusto, and just the right amount of humility, Jeremy Lott argues that hypocrisy isn't as bad as advertised, and that the critics of hypocrisy are often hypocritical themselves. A perfect read and a necessary corrective for this political season." --Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit.com "Lott argues convincingly that acts of hypocrisy can be embraced, not dismissed. In this highly-readable book, he makes the counterintuitive suggestion that hypocrisy is a natural element of the human condition." --David Mark, author, Going Dirty: The Art of Negative Campaigning "The popular usage of the term 'hypocrite' is expansive like a shotgun blast, and is often brought in to describe someone we don't like, doing something that we disagree with, involving some sort of perceived contradiction." It's an old familiar routine. Dick accuses Jane of rank hypocrisy, while ignoring his own moral inconsistencies. Jane is outraged by the charge, and fires right back. And author Jeremy Lott? Well he's blowing a wet raspberry at the whole ridiculous spectacle. In Defense of Hypocrisy deconstructs pat prejudices and shallow moralism to probe hypocrisy's real significance, asking: Why there is so much hypocrisy, and so much hatred of it? Why do we behave so inconsistently but then denounce those traits in others? Why are people so often fooled by hypocrites? What if hypocrisy is more than just a necessary evil? In fact, what if hypocrisy is also an engine of moral progress? In Defense of Hypocrisy is part political, part religious, part philosophical, and all honesty. Though the word has long since reached epithet status, Lott beckons the reader to see the real virtue-impoverished agendas behind the accusations and embrace a sturdier, more realistic understanding of a much-maligned vice. The charges have been brought, the jury bought, and the judge clears his throat to hand down the expected judgment: "Hypocrisy is a most damnable offense. . . " "Not so fast," says Jeremy Lott. "I object!" In Defense of Hypocrisy is the case for a mistrial-a thought-provoking, wit-filled, morally-charged, rollicking justification of good people who behave badly. Lott tackles the alleged two-facedness of popular targets from Bill Bennett to Dick Morris to Britney Spears. Far from focusing merely on politics, Lott looks at philosophy, history, theology, and pop culture to give the hypocrites their due. This gutsy exposé of the corrosive uses of hypocrisy accusations will challenge you to open your mind, hang the jury, and decide for yourself: Is hypocrisy really so bad?