Working paper on output diversity in the Research Excellence Framework 2029
BISA and the Political Studies Association (PSA) are pleased to announce the publication of a joint working paper on output diversity in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2029, which has been coordinated with Sub-Panel 19.
Given that the choices made in REF2029 will shape investment, staffing, and disciplinary survival across Politics and International Studies for years to come, both associations want to ensure that the full breadth of scholarship produced within their fields is recognised and fairly assessed.
The working paper examines whether REF2029 will genuinely deliver on its commitment to research diversity, or revert to established hierarchies favouring journal articles and monographs. The authors, Helena Farrand Carrapico and Stefan Wolff, argue that REF2029 represents the most explicit commitment to output diversity yet. Reviewing REF2021 data, they show that non-traditional outputs were vanishingly rare in UoA19 (just 20 of 4,146 submissions), yet scored comparably well across the sector, undermining assumptions that traditional formats maximise quality. They identify a range of plausible non-traditional outputs for Politics and International Studies, including policy reports, documentary films, podcasts, participatory toolkits, and research portfolios.
The working paper also identifies four key barriers to research diversity: institutional risk-aversion under acute financial pressure, panel capacity and evaluative uncertainty, disciplinary conservatism, and the contested outputs–impact boundary. It proposes enabling conditions, including early and credible panel guidance, stronger contextualising statements, sector-wide community building led by BISA and PSA, and learning from arts and humanities panels experienced in portfolio assessment. The authors conclude that pluralism is achievable (but not predetermined), requiring deliberate cultural change.
You can read and download the paper below. We encourage you to share it with colleagues and networks who are involved in REF.
