Unpacking the discourse surrounding the impact agenda in the Hong Kong Research Assessment Exercise 2020
Danling Li,
William Yat Wai Lo and
Rui Yang
Research Evaluation, 2024, vol. 33, issue 1, 147-67
Abstract:
Research with economic utility and social value has been increasingly valued. Such an emphasis can be evidenced by the newly included assessment element of ‘societal impact’ in performance-based research funding (PBRF) schemes in different higher education systems around the world. This paper investigates how the non-academic impact is constructed and perceived in the Hong Kong Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) 2020, taking into account the local socio-cultural characteristics in the context of Hong Kong. Data sources include 13 impact case studies in the education panel submitted for the Hong Kong RAE 2020 and semi-structured interview with 17 education academics in Hong Kong. Findings revealed that the non-academic impact was constructed through a narrative pattern: (1) problem identification: tensions and synergies between local and international discourse; (2) problem resolution: prioritization of the evidence-based applied education research (with funding); (3) resolution dissemination: strategic employment of promotional genre. The paper discusses how decolonization, academic entrepreneurialism and collectivist culture have characterized the framing and understanding of the non-academic impact in the Hong Kong academia, contributing to the discourse on neoliberalism in higher education by providing a nuanced, local perspective on the impact agenda. Policy implications for a more localized and flexible impact agenda are also provided.
Keywords: societal/non-academic impact; Hong Kong Research Assessment Exercise (RAE); decolonization; academic entrepreneurialism; collectivist culture (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/reseval/rvae034 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:rseval:v:33:y:2024:i:1:p:147-67.
Access Statistics for this article
Research Evaluation is currently edited by Julia Melkers, Emanuela Reale and Thed van Leeuwen
More articles in Research Evaluation from Oxford University Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().