Clashing Concepts and Methods: Assessing Excellence in the Humanities and Social Sciences

The humanities are going through a period of exceptional vitality characterised by the proliferation of novel interpretative frameworks, methodologies and perspectives. Yet they—and, to a lesser extent, the social sciences—feel threatened by the rising tide of research assessment which appear to be predominantly derived from the needs and experience of the physical and natural sciences and depend on the application of standardized assessment tools. This position paper intends to contribute to the debate on the current criteria of evaluation and measures for excellence in the Humanities by casting light on their conceptual implications and methodological assumptions. It argues that decisions about their relative weight are not simply technical but also reflect underlying value systems.