Rankings and the Threat from the East

Recently, we have heard a lot about global university rankings' responsibilities. Some have drawn attention to the increasing number of universities included in the rankings or the new rankings that allow universities to showcase the remarkable and interesting things they have been doing for society or the environment. There are claims that the well-known rankers are promoting global equity by including many more African and Asia universities.

Perhaps. But it seems that some rankings, particularly the two big-name ones, THE and QS, have another function, which is to downplay the rise of Chinese and maybe other Asian institutions and maintain the dominant position of the elite schools of the Global North. 

The table below shows the number of universities included in the top 100 universities in various global rankings. The table is arranged in ascending order according to the number of Mainland Chinese universities and refers to the most recent edition. 

Chinese universities are apparently uninterested in the rankings that supposedly assess contributions or commitment to the environment, sustainability, or equity. There are none in the top 100 of the new QS Sustainability Rankings or the GreenMetric Rankings and only one in the THE Impact Rankings. On the other hand, China does very well in Nature Index and in Leiden Rankings Publications and Publications in the top 1% of journals and fairly well in the URAP, Scimago, and National Taiwan University rankings. In short, China does best in those rankings that emphasize recent achievements in research in STEM subjects. 

The UK does best in rankings that include a substantial weighting for reputation, internationalization,  or activity related to sustainability and much less well in research-based rankings. 

The USA hasn't really bothered with the GreenMetric and THE Impact rankings. Its best performance is in UniRank, which is a measure of web activity, and Webometrics, which is half web activity, CWUR, which includes faculty and alumni achievement, and US News Best Global Universities, which has a strong reputation element. It is not so good in Nature Index, URAP, and NTU, which are research-based. 

It seems, to simplify a bit, that British and American universities benefit from indicators that measure or try to measure resources, reputation, web presence, and international activity, Chinese and some other Asian institutions are rapidly moving ahead in research and innovation.

Table: Number of Universities in the Top 100

Ranking	Country of publication	USA	UK	Mainland China
QS Sustainability	UK	12	28	0
UniRank	Australia	75	7	0
GreenMetric	Indonesia	3	3	1
THE Impact	UK	6	25	1
USN Global	USA	41	11	4
MosIUR	Russia	41	15	4
QS World	UK	27	17	5
CWUR	UAE	50	9	6
GEURS	France	18	8	6
Webometrics	Spain	53	9	6
THE World	UK	36	11	7
RUR	Georgia	38	11	7
ARWU	China	38	8	10
NTU	Taiwan	36	10	14
Scimago- universities	Spain	39	7	24
URAP	Turkiye	28	6	23
Leiden P 1%	Netherlands	39	8	28
Leiden P	Netherlands	31	6	36
Nature Index -  academic	UK	37	5	35