Nurturing Novelty: Toulmin's Greenhouse, Journal Rankings and Knowledge Evolution

• Author: Ilfryn Price,Dermot Breslin,Douglas W.S. Renwick
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/emre.12334
• Published date: 01 March 2019
• Date: 01 March 2019

Nurturing Novelty: Toulmin’s Greenhouse,

Journal Rankings and Knowledge Evolution

DOUGLAS W.S. RENWICK,

1

DERMOT BRESLIN

2

and ILFRYN PRICE

3

1

Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, 50 ShakespeareStreet, Nottingham NG1 4FQ, UK

2

Sheffield University Management School, The University of Sheffield, Conduit Road, Sheffield S10 1FL, UK

3

Sheffield Business School, SheffieldHallam University, City Campus, Howard Street, Sheffield S1 1WB, UK

Reflecting on Toulmin’s, 1972conceptualization of the academicresearch process,we fast-forward his thinkingto

the current climate of academic excellence and associated journal ranking lists. We argue that the formal and

informal use of such rankings throughout the hierarchy of research institutions creates an artificial environment

within which favoured ‘branches’of knowledge continue to flourish at the expenseof new conceptual saplings. This

‘greenhouse’effect mightresult in the creationof a knowledge treewhich is increasinglyunfit to the external world for

which it is intended. We thus step back and examine wider implications of these factors on the broader evolution of

knowledge in the research process. In sum, we argue for a Toulminian explanation of the process by which journal

ranking lists reduce academic innovation and creativity, bias academic selection and constrain dissemination

processes in the academic community.

Keywords: journal ranking; evolution; Toulmin

Introduction

Concepts which are ahead of their time in knowledge

evolution can, as Toulmin (1972) illustrated, lie dormant

or be discussed largely to negate them. His own

conceptual evolution is a case in point. Toulmin (1922–

2009) was a British philosopher known for his analysis

of moral reasoning and in 1972 published Human

understanding, where he presented a less-known

evolutionary account of conc eptual change. In contrast

to Kuhn’s (1996)seminal work, The structure ofscientific

revolutions, Toulmin argued conceptual change as

evolutionary rather than revolutionary. Toulmin presents

an insightful way to view the evolution over time of

knowledge, and scientific knowledge, a special kind of

knowledge (Plotkin, 1994). We argue that a Toulminian

approach merits re-visiting, to shed light on the influence

of journal ranking systems and research assessment

exercises on the academic resear ch process. Of course,

while others have commented on such influences too

(e.g., Suddaby et al., 2011; Holt and den Hond, 2013),

our concern is to deploy them to revisit Toulmin, who

argued variation in concepts as subject to selection from

both intrinsic (intellectual) and extrinsic (social) factors,

acknowledging that the two can sometimes coincide but

at other times act in opposition. As he put it:

A new concept,theory or strategyfor example, becomes

an effective ‘possibility’in a scientific discipline only

when it is taken seriously by the influential members

of the relevant profession, and it becomes ‘established’

only when it wins their positive endorsement.

Conversely, an innovation which the current reference

group declares ‘totally unsound’is for the time being

as good as dead (Toulmin, 1972: 266).

Using such a framework, and drawing from the wider

literature evidence surrounding research auditing

exercises, this article explores the impact that journal

rankings, as measures of research output quality, might

have on extrinsic selective pressures at multiple levels in

the researchprocess. Following Toulmin,we view science

as a multi-level co-evolutionary system in which an

ecology of concepts struggle for survival within

explanatory frameworks and paradigms alongsi de the

ecology of supporting research institutions. While putting

forward the notion that science might be viewed through

an evolutionarylens is far from novel, examining specific

literature for evidence of an evolving knowledge

ecosystem in this manner can shed light on both the

Correspondence: Douglas W. S. Renwick, Associate Professor in

Sustainable Workforce Management, Nottingham Business School,

Nottingham Trent University, 50 Shakespeare Street, Nottingham, NG1

4FQ, UK. E-maildouglas.renwick@ntu.ac.uk

European Management Review, Vol. 16, 167–178, (2019)

DOI: 10.1111/emre.12334

©2018 European Academy of Management