300469 Quantifying quality (S) (SoSe 2022)

Since decades the communication system of science is subject of an observation by numbers. Compared with other social systems that also experience such arrangements, the process started early and is closely connected with the advent of citation data bases that were invented after WW II. Interestingly, the quantification has strong links to the media that are used for communication of the social system. This does not only hold for the citation data bases that collect information about publications as a basic unit of communication but also for more recent developments like the usage of social media to communicate scientific results.

The aim of the seminar is to ask for the relevance and consequences of such types of quantification for social systems in general. It takes science as an example but also aims to unfold a comparative perspective to elaborate on general patterns of this type of media-based, quantified observation. In doing so, it discusses various aspects like shifts in the meaning and understanding of the quantified entities, ‘reactivity’ of the quantified social structures, goal displacements within the social system, as well as shifts in the role of the instruments used for quantification.
The seminar consists of three sections.

1. Conceptualizing quantification. In this section, basic concepts of the quantification of social structures are read and discussed with the aim of developing an analytical instrument for the seminar

2. Quantification within science. In this section of the seminar, the focus is narrowed to science, as seminal readings about quantification within science are discussed.

3. During the third section the participants are expected to select and analyse an empirical example of a number-based observation of science and to apply the analytical instruments that were introduced in the seminar.