The Academic Freedom Index and Its indicators: Introduction to new global time-series V-Dem data

Janika Spannagel () and Katrin Kinzelbach ()
Additional contact information
Janika Spannagel: Freie Universität Berlin
Katrin Kinzelbach: FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, 2023, vol. 57, issue 5, No 3, 3969-3989

Abstract: Abstract The Academic Freedom Index is the first conceptually thorough assessment of academic freedom worldwide and a times series dataset going back to 1900. While some previous datasets exist, they are geographically limited and methodologically or conceptually insufficient to offer a comprehensive picture of the levels of academic freedom across time and space. This paper introduces the new expert-coded dataset that includes the overall Academic Freedom Index alongside several specific indicators, to which more than 2050 country experts around the world have contributed and which is freely available as part of V-Dem’s time-series data releases. The paper discusses its advantages compared to other types of data on academic freedom, details the conceptualization of the new indicators, and offers a content and convergent validation of the results. The dataset provides ample opportunities for scholars to conduct in-depth research on academic freedom and its infringements, and for policymakers and advocates to monitor and analyze patterns and trends of academic freedom around the world.

Keywords: Academic freedom; Institutional autonomy; Right to science; Human rights; Expert assessments; Dataset (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11135-022-01544-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:qualqt:v:57:y:2023:i:5:d:10.1007_s11135-022-01544-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11135

DOI: 10.1007/s11135-022-01544-0

Access Statistics for this article

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology is currently edited by Vittorio Capecchi

More articles in Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().