Changes in Scholars’ Ways of Knowledge Production Shaped by Systematic Measures

Abstract

This paper considers the role played by systematic measuring in academic conducts. The introduction of entrepreneurial culture into academia fosters competitive atmospheres through its emphasis on personal merit, which entails quantitative performance measurement. As knowledge production is one of scholars’ core missions, this study aims to articulate impacts on ways of knowledge production influenced by environmental factors, comprising measuring instruments, institutional management, funding bodies and state policy. By interviewing 41 scholars in Taiwan and exploring their accounts of academic practices, this paper empirically analyses how knowledge production has been shaped by policy environments. These modifying behaviour patterns include a selection of research topics, a design for research agenda, strategies for grant applications and publications, engendering delicate changes in the epistemic properties of research. From this, it characterizes power relations between researchers, scientific communities and the state in the neoliberal age.