Towards a European economics of economics: Monitoring a decade of top research and providing some explanation

Summary

This study documents a decade of mainstream research output by European economics institutions. In contrast to previous European economics departmental rankings, we investigate the changing pattern of the ranking over two subperiods and a total decade. The validity of our bibliometric approach is demonstrated by a comparison with gradings of UK economic departments in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE). We also provide some explanation of the ranking based on regional factors and institutional features. Strong evidence for the 'institutional oligopoly' of editors and authors hypothesis is found. However, in a dynamic context this departmental concentration of authorship and editorial board membership does not represent a 'closed shop'. We find several departments entering the centre stage of economic mainstream for the first time towards the end of the 1990s.