Response to the review of the Research Assessment Exercise
From Pickering and Chatto Publishers
Our submission concentrates on three of the principal concerns of the review:
- The need to properly recognise collaborations and partnership across institutions and with organisations
outside Higher Education.
- The need to fully recognise all aspects of excellence in research, particularly value added to professional
practice.
- Lack of discrimination in the current rating system.
Pickering & Chatto’s involvement with the Research Assessment Exercise
Pickering & Chatto specialise in publishing multi-volume editions of primary research texts for the
international academic library market. Our editions are held by many of the top research institutions around
the world. All our editions are selected and edited by academics from the UK and overseas. Our editions
often take many years to come to fruition and have received widespread critical and academic acclaim. Our
aim is to provide researchers with reliable, well-edited texts, which can provide a resource for further
research, and to help preserve and retain texts for the benefits of future generations.
In the course of publishing these editions we come in to close contact with many academics directly affected
by the Research Assessment Exercise. Their ability and willingness to be involved in our editions is often
directly affected by the results of the exercise in terms of the priorities placed on them by their departments
as a result of the funding secured through the exercise.
Our primary concern is there seems a perception among many of the academics we work with that the
research involved in editing one of our editions is currently undervalued by the Research Assessment
Exercise, and consequently by their departments. They feel that it is often more difficult to secure the
necessary funding for editing an edition than it would be to write a monograph. We feel that this perception
needs to addressed, as we know that the amount of research necessary for one of our editions is at least
equivalent to that required to write a monograph, if not greater.
As mentioned above, we draw our academic editors from the international community. We are concerned
that our academic editors from the US and elsewhere do not seem to experience the same difficulties in
securing funding for their research on these editions as do our UK academic editors. We believe that this
may damage the competitiveness and quality of UK academic research in comparison with that of other
countries. The proportion of our academic editors being recruited from the US and elsewhere has increased
dramatically in recent years, in part because we are finding it more and more difficult to find UK academics
willing and able to commit to editing our editions.
The research involved in editing a Pickering & Chatto critical edition
Pickering & Chatto editions are edited to a very high academic standard and must stand up to the scrutiny of
the international academic community. The success of these editions can be demonstrated by the extent of
the holdings of many of the most highly-rated research libraries, and by the many positive peer reviews they
have received in well-respected journals. Lists of these holdings and samples of these reviews can be
provided.
In order to publish one of our editions there is often considerable discussion and debate about the scope and
content of the edition. This stage is open to peer review as we seek the views of leading academics from all
our main market areas. This stage requires our academics editors to have a detailed knowledge of all the
works of a particular author or extensive knowledge of all the available literature on a given topic or period.
This initial stage, in itself, can entail considerable research in identifying variant texts and editions.
Emphasis is placed on finding rare and unusual texts, which have not been republished or are largely
unavailable to the academic community there can also be considerable work entailed in identifying and
attributing works to specific writers. Our selections can often help to define or redefine the canon of a given
author or can help to lead to a re-assessment of their work and contributions.
This is only the start of the research our editions require. All texts are closely edited and comparisons made
between variant texts and manuscript material. In addition to the close readings of the text our editors have
to identify and annotate the figures, phrases and allusions in these texts. This can often identify many new
aspects of the text that have previously been hidden and have only come to light as the result of extensive
research. Some of the annotation in our texts has taken years to track down, involved trips to many different
research libraries and the consultation of potentially hundreds of other texts.
In addition to this close editing of the texts our editors contribute editorial introductions to draw together
many of their findings and to help to situate the texts in their appropriate setting. These introductions often
contain many new insights into texts or authors and are of a quality equivalent to those required of an article
in an academic journal or a monograph.
In conclusion
We feel therefore that the efforts of our academic editors should be suitably acknowledged in any new
Research Assessment Exercise. As mentioned above, there seems to be a general perception amongst
academics and their departments that this is not the case. This may not be an accurate perception of the
Research Assessment Exercise. However if it is not, then this perception needs to be redressed and a more
accurate view fostered in the departments and academics involved.
If there is justification for this view under the present system, then we would submit that this discrimination is
unfair and does not represent the valuable research that is involved with editing texts.
We fully support the aims of the Research Assessment Exercise in fostering and monitoring the state of
research in UK higher education and our wish is to ensure that the efforts of our UK academic editors and
the valuable research they undertake is encouraged and valued appropriately. We would be happy to
enlarge on any of the points made above or to provide supporting evidence.