The onward march of Asia in HE and innovation rankings

Despite our turbulent times, university rankings continue unabated. The release of the Times Higher Education (THE) 2021 World University Rankings completes the ‘big three’ university rankings for the year, the others being QS and the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU).

The three rankings, when looked at over a three-year period, confirm, despite methodological differences and variations in criteria for inclusion, that Asia is on the rise, accounting for close to 30% of globally ranked institutions. For the purposes of this exercise we exclude the Middle East and Oceania (which are included in the various rankings).

While Asian institutions are performing better, there are some key patterns worth observing. The first is the inexorable rise of Chinese higher education, built off the back of long-term investments in human capital and growing research expenditure, diffusion and absorption of knowledge (although some would be critical of the manner in which knowledge from elsewhere has been acquired), as well as, more generally, its emergence as an economic powerhouse.

China’s share of the Asian rankings has increased to reach more than one-fifth in the rankings by THE and QS and more than half in ARWU’s. This sharp difference between ARWU and the others is related to the very different methodologies in ARWU (which includes publications in top-ranked journals and Fields Medals) compared to the other two.

Nonetheless, the performance generally, but specifically in AWRU, points to the increased quality of performance of Chinese institutions.

Very tentatively, some realignment within Asian economies can be identified. The share of ranked institutions accounted for by the more developed countries, including Japan and South Korea, has declined. India presents a mixed outlook, with a rise in places in the THE ranking over the past three years, but slight declines in the other two rankings schema, while Malaysian institutions are moving up.

Also of note, as part of this emergent realignment, is the rise in rankings of ‘green shoot’ countries including Pakistan, Thailand, Vietnam and, to some extent, the Philippines.

In some of these cases, countries are punching above their weight relative to their levels of economic and social development. In absolute numbers, for example, Pakistan has 17 institutions in the THE ranking, rising from nine just two years ago.

However, there are a number of caveats. First, is that in the THE ranking there are significantly more ranked institutions this year (and previously), thus widening the pool.

Second, in the top 200 in the THE ranking, Asia is represented by China, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Other emerging Asian countries, including India, have not cracked the top 200. That takes time and patience.

Third, the tentative realignment within Asia should not be overstated because, for example, Japan and South Korea (and even to some extent Taiwan), the more developed countries in Asia, still account for very significant numbers of institutions in absolute terms.

Global Innovation Index 2020

The just-released Global Innovation Index 2020, a comprehensive approach covering 131 countries which encompasses both input and output domains of innovation, further illuminates these points, including with respect to university rankings and performance.

According to the index, while the top 10 performers are dominated by the United States and Europe, some Asian economies are either inching close to the top 10, have now become part of the exclusive club or are maintaining their position in the top 10.

In terms of movement towards the top 10, China is ranked in 14th place for the second year in a row, Hong Kong is in 11th place (up from 13th last year) and Japan is in 16th place (a slight decrease from 15th place last year). South Korea is now in the top 10 – in 10th position, having moved up from 11th place last year, while Singapore maintains its eighth position.

Malaysia (33rd), Philippines (50th), India (48th), Thailand (44th) and Vietnam (42nd) round out the top 50 Asian economies. Of these countries, India and the Philippines have improved their position while Vietnam has held its position.

Vietnam, India, Thailand and the Philippines are regarded as innovation achievers, that is, they are performing better on innovation than their level of economic development would indicate. However, the report does point to a growing inequality between the best and emerging performers compared to other parts of Asia, Africa and Latin America.

It is clear that to be in the top 10 or thereabouts requires a comprehensive, integrated and cohesive approach to an entire innovation eco-system comprising sophisticated inputs (infrastructure, business environment, institutional capability, investment in human capital, including all tiers of education, research by universities and businesses and access to capital, among other things) and outputs, such as high value goods and services, patents, advanced exports, creative goods and services and strong productivity growth, among other things.

China and India

Drilling down, China is getting closer to having these all-round capabilities. One of the key strengths in China is its ability to transform input into outputs efficiently and effectively – its output rank is sixth in the world (well ahead of its overall rank), compared to its input rank of 26th.

Its other key strengths are in human capital, market and business sophistication, knowledge and technology outputs and creative outputs. For example, China is best in class in formal training in firms, secondary school education (PISA scores), patents and utility intellectual property and achieves a very high ranking in knowledge absorption, research expenditure in firms, productivity, creative outputs, high value manufacturing and high technology exports. China’s position is consistent with its strong industrial base.

China’s weakest pillar is in institutions (political, regulatory and business environments) where it ranks 62nd. In fact, this is common in a number of Asian countries, with the exception of Singapore (ranked first in the world), Hong Kong (fifth) and Japan (eighth).

India, another emerging global player, is ranked 48th and is progressively improving. Its performance in the innovation ranking is far better in relative terms than its performance in other key rankings, such as the UN Human Development Index and the Yale Environmental Protection Index.

Key areas of strength for India include knowledge and technology outputs, ICT services exports (where it is first in the world), science and engineering graduates, company spend on R&D, trade, knowledge diffusion and absorption, publications and access to credit, but there remain concerns.

Despite its improving position in the World Bank Doing Business Index, the quality of its infrastructure remains weaker than its overall innovation performance, as does its institutional strength, although that is improving.

Key concerns include its environmental performance (it ranks 98th) and female engagement in the most educated part of the labour market (where it ranks at 101). Other areas that need attention include ICT access and usage, which is well short of its performance on ICT exports, and creative outputs, the latter perhaps surprising given India’s rich and vast cultural assets and heritage.

Two more points are worth highlighting with respect to Asian economies. The Global Innovation Index measures the quality of innovation, as reflected in patent applications, citable documents (h-index) and the average score of a country’s three top-ranked institutions in the QS ranking. These three parameters are reflective of strong education and research capabilities.

While the US and Europe dominate in quality of innovation, it is instructive that India, Malaysia, Thailand, Japan and South Korea all rank higher in that than in their overall innovation ranking, clearly indicating that the quality of their innovation is on the rise.

The second point to note is that innovation is an activity which has a spill-over effect, including sharing and diffusion of knowledge. To this end, the Global Innovation Index measures science and technology clusters on a sub-national basis, drawing on measures including the location of inventors and publications. On this score, a Japanese cluster leads the world, followed by one in China and South Korea. Of the top 100 clusters, China has 17 clusters while the US leads with 25.

The future

What of the future? Looking ahead, the impact of COVID-19 is, and will clearly be, significant for a number of these rankings and indices. Already there is some discussion about reframing methodologies and metrics in the years ahead for global university rankings.

One possible idea that we put forward is for the development of resilience indicators for universities (either as a separate ranking or built into existing rankings), which could focus on the capacity of universities to bounce back financially, to diversify their revenue streams, to lead COVID-19 recovery research, engage with students remotely, conduct community and industry outreach and to manage risk. The difficulty of developing such metrics is not to be underestimated.

More broadly, there are many wildcards which go to the heart of the various rankings. Of concern is the possibility that countries will (further) retreat inwards, thus constraining the free flow of ideas, know-how and people (including perhaps students) which is so essential for a global knowledge economy.

Such a retreat would likely exacerbate inequalities in economic development around the world. It could have a similar impact on industrial structure and value chains: the push for local supply chains and home-grown industry development in the context of the pandemic, while appealing in some ways, in our view should not be a ‘Trojan horse’ for further protection and trade wars.

Further, the momentum that some developing nations have built towards becoming significant global knowledge players could be constrained by the slowdown of economic growth, especially, for example, in India which has amongst the highest rates of COVID-19 in the world.

On the other hand, as the process of churn continues and old industries disappear and new industries and business models appear, the need for flexible education and training requiring new and adaptable capabilities within higher education institutions will be more critical than ever.

And what will the impact be on research? Will scarce research resources be directed towards pandemic recovery and prevention at the expense of other fields or will research and innovation more worryingly be ‘sacrificed’ in the name of short-term economic recovery?

Both of these are alluded to in the Global Innovation Index. Global collaboration drawing on specialist national capability is the way forward in our opinion.

Dr Anand Kulkarni is associate director, planning, performance and risk at Victoria University, Australia.