Ridiculous, if you ask me (needless to state, this is a very personal opinion). Unfortunately, in Economics (you find that category under “Samfundsøkonomi” in the linked pdf), there will be many years till Denmark will catch up with the best places in the Netherlands, for instance (see here an Economics journal ranking of the Tinbergen Institute (TI) , which has its imperfections– such as Journal of Finance placed in the ‘AA’ category… — but it is way way better), in competitiveness, attitude in this context etc. Not to mention the top places in US or UK (NB: the non-existence/ non-marketing of an explicit journal ranking on the (web)sites of those departments does not mean the non-existence of a very strict, informal hierarchy — decisive in hiring and, especially, promotion decisions–, in many ways similar in spirit to the one of the TI linked above!).
The simple test the folks who made up this hierarchy (there was and still is a lot of disagreement among them apparently, this solution seems to be a compromise solution) should(have) subject(ed) themselves to is the following: if you are in the process of deciding where to submit the best paper you ever produced as yet, i.e. something you are satisfied with and very proud of, would you submit it to Econometrica, AER, JPE, QJE, ReStud, or to any of the other places (yes, some extremely good, much better than others paired with them…, but just somewhat below the very top category), which are placed in the same category in this ranking (if I were them, I would ask this question to any potential candidate I would consider hiring in my Danish Econ department). That first hierarchy level (labeled “2” in the pdf) can/should be further split in at least 3 sublevels (even the general editors of those journals in question would all agree; I doubt they were asked when this ranking was made up…). I won’t even touch on assessing the fact that the rest of the journals were all bunched together in a second hierarchical level (labeled “1” in the document). This is not about my being obsessed with rankings, this is about having an idea about scientific quality. And about proper incentives.
PS. The hilarious thing is that some would like to add even more journals that nobody reads/cites to these two categories.
This is a fxxxxxx joke! Sebster, I'd get out of there as soon as I can.
…with an extra clarification: of course there are many reasons why using just Impact Factors (IF) might not be first best. I discussed some of those even on this blog, with other occasions. But, rather than something completely ridiculous like this, yes, IF's would have been way better.
I don't know the answer to either question, I wonder myself. As for the conjecture, I am afraid you are right there: "sociatal arrangements" (if can I call them like that? I mean all the wage ceilings and the general lack of incentives for the best of the best, lack of the competitive dimension and the (tacit) fight against anything that looks "conspicuous", even
Yes, also Maths journals come in questionnable ordering. I hope they are not gonna take the new scale literally. Is it open to debate or this is it? Why don't they simply use Impact Factors? Maybe you have got the proof that you just cannot separate university from the rest of the Danish society?
Why would you settle for a job (not even) half done?!
Rather something to celebrate. Is first time we reach agreement on categories of publications.
>Danish economist<br />Tak! :-). <br />I as well know several researchers in Denmark who would vehemently object. No surprise: they happen to be also the ones who publish seriously, are recognized internationally, and the young very ambitions ones who think the world is theirs (and this is how people with great potential should think in an academic world that does not cut their wings…),
Sebastian, <br />I completely agree and I indeed suspect this is a compromise. Many of us think the same way, but this is ofcourse about politics, not economics! <br /><br />Mvh, <br />a Danish economist