By Justin Lafreniere
The Social Science Research Network (SSRN) features nearly 250,000 authors and has more than 1.7 million users. According to Carlos Ramirez, professor of economics and editor of George Mason University’s SSRN webpage, SSRN constitutes “the largest repository of academic research in the world in the fields of economics and finance.”
Now, SSRN has ranked George Mason as the number 16 university, and Peter Boettke, University Professor of economics and philosophy, as the number 21 individual ranking of all authors.
The SSRN rankings “attempt to measure the scholarly impact of the authors currently affiliated with the organizations represented in the SSRN eLibrary,” according to their site, by tracking how prolific authors are and the number of times their work is cited in other publications.
Policy makers, academics and even bloggers who write about economics and finance regularly often use SSRN to read research papers prior to their publication in scholarly journals and books.
Ramirez says these rankings solidify Mason standing as having a top economic program. “Our ranking in SSRN is a reflection for the demand and interest in our research,” he says. “We are producing work highly valued by other researchers, specialists and the public in general.”
Work by George Mason faculty members was downloaded more than 18,000 times in the past year, and nearly 85,000 times overall. Boettke’s work has been downloaded more than 22,000 times total, a quarter of those in the past year.
While admitting it is “certainly exciting” to be ranked so highly and among other superstar names in economics, Boettke insists that his personal ranking is due to the overall quality of the department, particularly “the great support we get from the upper administration at Mason and the leadership in our department as reflected by the department chairs,” he says.
While the ranking is important, Boettke also points to the work that his colleagues are doing, including publications by Larry White, Chris Coyne and Tyler Cowen, whose book “Average Is Over” had some of its core ideas discussed in Time magazine.
“I am thrilled to be part of an academic department that has such a strong commitment to the scientific quest in economics and a broader scholarly impact across academic disciplines and to a more general audience,” Boettke says.
Rankings on SSRN also include law schools. In January, Mason’s School of Law ranked number 17 nationally, with more than 35,000 downloads in the past year. Law professor Todd Zywicki believes that the rankings, like Mason’s Economics Department and Law School, are intertwined.
“The George Mason tradition is one of openness,” says Zywicki. “It cultivates a unique overlap.” U.S. News & World Report ranks Mason’s School of Law as a top 50 program, and the program is the youngest in that grouping.
The SSRN rankings reflect this close grouping, as do many of the paper topics. Interdisciplinary projects and papers are common at Mason and have made it a leading university in the study of intersections between the law and economics, Zywicki points out. It creates an openness that “encourages the breaking of boundaries,” says Zywicki.
“We do economics with attitude at Mason, and it is very exciting to be part of that tradition,” Boettke says.