Two-hundredth Working Paper Published
A working paper is a form of preliminary publication that makes it possible to quickly present for discussion among the academic community the results of the latest research. On September 5, the HSE Basic Research Programme issued its 200th working paper.
More than 30 series of different working papers are published at the HSE. Several of them are issued by the HSE Publishing House, and the rest are printed with the support of the HSE Basic Research Programme. The working papers on basic research come in 13 series and are published in electronic format in English. The first working paper ‘2D:4D Asymmetry and Academic Performance: Evidence from Moscow and Manilа’ by John Nye, Grigory Androuschak, Desire Desierto, Gareth Jones, and Maria Yudkevich was published in September 2011. The 200th anniversary working paper was issued on September 5, 2013, in the series ‘Sociology’ and was dedicated to the problems of employment. The author of the paper is Anna Zudina, Junior Research Fellow of the HSE Centre for Labour Market Studies.
As a preliminary version of a research article that registers an author’s rights to ideas and research results, a working paper helps the author get feedback from their colleagues to improve the text by taking into account comments received and to publish it as a complete article in a foreign journal. Compared to the time required for publication in a scientific journal, working papers on basic research are issued in the shortest time possible. On average, the cycle takes no longer than three weeks from application to publication and the authors are supported by experts and language specialists when translating their texts into English.
Not only research fellows but also students and postgraduate students can author working papers.
Last year, young researchers of the HSE Department of Politics and Political Analysis Anton Sobolev and Irina Sobobleva, in collaboration with Professor Regina Smyth of Indiana University, published the working paper ‘A Well-Organized Plаy: Symbolic Politics and the Effect of the Pro-Putin Rallies’, on the basis of which an article then came out in the foreign journal ‘Problems of Post-Communism’.
Maria Yudkevich, the HSE’s Vice Rector, commented that not all working papers on basic research go on to be published in academic journals. Unfortunately, a wide range of authors stop here. This is certainly a temporary situation; in the future, working papers will be an intermediate step prior to publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
Research texts can be also published in a series of working papers of western universities and research centres. For example, this year the article ‘Redistribution and the Political Support of Free Entry Policy in the Schumpeterian Model with Heterogeneous Agents’ by Dmitry Veselov, Junior Research Fellow of the HSE Laboratory of Macroeconomic Analysis, was issued in a series of working papers of the Sorbonne Economic Centre.
Since 2011, all working papers on basic research are hosted in the Social Science Research Network (SSRN), one of the world’s largest electronic archives of scientific articles and working papers in key areas of the socio-economic sciences. And since September 2013, all working papers are also hosted in the Research Papers in Economics (RеPEс), an archive network of electronic documents on topics of economics.
An analysis carried out by the HSE Centre for Basic Research shows that foreign colleagues are interested in many of the University’s working papers. Among the works leading according to the number of downloads and views is a research study dedicated to an analysis of innovation concepts: ‘Innovation Concepts and Typology — An Evolutionary Discussion’. Another two popular texts concern education processes and structural economic changes in the BRICS group: ‘The Economic Returns to Higher Education in the BRIC Countries and Their Implications for Higher Education Expansion’, and ‘Deconstructing the BRICs: ‘Structural Transformation and Aggregate Productivity Growth’.
The publication of working papers is taken into account when estimating the publishing activity of the HSE’s research fellows and when calculating academic bonuses. Publication is also required for receiving individual grants from the HSE Academic Fund. Working papers are selected by the series’ editors. Detailed information about publishing is provided on the site. The list of series is subject to expansion; all suggestions are reviewed by Maria Yudkevich.
Ludmila Mezentseva, HSE News Service
Grigory Androuschak
John V.C. Nye
Anton Sergeevich Sobolev
Irina V. Soboleva
See also:
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1,000
SSRN downloads is a milestone recently achieved by ‘Innovation Concepts and Typology – An Evolutionary Discussion’, an article by Maxim Kotsemir, Alexander Abroskin and Dirk Meissner – one of the first publications issued as part of the HSE Basic Research Programme.
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