Posted 04 November 2008
UCD economics reaches top 5%
The UCD School of Economics and the UCD Geary Institute are currently ranked in the top 5% of economics research institutions in the world, according to the Research Papers in Economics (RePEc) database which includes 3,917 economics institutions and 17,707 registered authors from across the globe.
RePEc ranks the UCD Geary Institute at 17 in Europe and 67 in the world. And the UCD School of Economics at 47 in Europe and 135 in the world.
Institutions like the Centre for Economic Policy Research in London, the European Central Bank, and the Bank of England, are included in the RePEc database, explains Professor Rodney Thom, Head of the UCD School of Economics. “If the comparison was based on Schools of Economics that offer a full compliment of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, then the UCD School of Economics would sit comfortably in the RePEc European top 30 and the world top 70.”
“The UCD School of Economics and the UCD Geary Institute are now in a position unprecedented in the history of Irish economics,” says Professor Thom. “The institute offers significant support in terms of the development of graduate programmes. It acts as a focal point for economics research in University College Dublin. This increased international ranking and profile will help attract the brightest students from across the world as we develop graduate programmes in collaboration with NUI Maynooth and Trinity College Dublin.”
“The RePEc positioning is a significant achievement for the UCD School of Economics and the UCD Geary Institute which was established just 10 years ago under the Irish government’s Programme for Research in Third-Level Institutions (PRTLI*). It’s encouraging to see the international profile of our economics research improving over time,” says Professor Colm Harmon, Director of the UCD Geary Institute.
“This reflects positively on the institute having economics as a centre of focus. With internal and external fellows coming on board all the time, the increase looks set to continue.”
RePEc (Research Papers in Economics) is a collaborative effort of hundreds of volunteers in 63 countries to enhance the dissemination of research in economics. The heart of the project is a decentralized database of working papers, journal articles and software components. Rankings are based on a sample of the research output in Economics and Finance. Only material catalogued in RePEc is considered and only those institutions listed in EDIRC and claimed as affiliation by the respective, registered authors can be measured.
*The PRTLI was set up by the Irish government under the Higher Education Authority to propel Ireland towards an international profile as a leading location for world class research and development.
