Research Policy and Higher Education Studies
The research group on Research Policy and Higher Education Studies led by Prof Benedetto Lepori, focuses on issues of higher education governance, university management and theory of S&T indicators.
Fields of expertise:
- governance and organisational structures of higher education institutions
- institutional theory, particularly institutional logics approaches and hybrid organisations
- development of data infrastructure for S&T studies
- diversity and characterisation of higher education systems
- comparative analysis of national research policies and funding systems
- indicators to characterise research funding systems and higher education institutions
Current projects include:
- Diversity of higher education systems, differentiation processes and policy mixes
- Avoiding Peripheralisation: Swiss and British HEIs Participation in the European Universities Initiative
Recently concluded projects included:
- RDM@SSM - Research Data Management @ Summer School in Social Science Methods
- Framework for systematic communication between trainers and data stewards to facilitate professionalization and the exchange of experiences, best practices, needs, and to develop training modules
- European Universities Initiative 5 Years On: A Research and Practice Symposium
- Scientific workshop on using generative AI for science and higher education studies
- ETERIV - Implementation and further development of the European Tertiary Education Register
- The Employment of Academics and Administrators in European Higher Education: National and Organizational Determinants
Our researchers collaborated and received funding from different academic and public funding institutions...
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
- European Commission
- European Social Fund
- Swissuniversities
- Movetia
- Swiss Science Council
Our recent publications include:
- Lambrechts A.A. (2025). Mechanisms of Alliance Formation across the European Universities Initiative
- Lepori B., Bornmann, L., & Gay, M. (2025). Finding “similar” universities using ChatGPT for institutional benchmarking: A large‐scale comparison of European universities
- Lepori B. & Todorovic, N. (2025). Words connecting communities: Representing the polysemy of argumentation
- Lambrechts A.A., Lepori B., & Cavallaro, M. (2024). The European Universities initiative: between status hierarchies and inclusion
- Bornmann, L., & Lepori B. (2024). The use of ChatGPT to find similar institutions for institutional benchmarking
- Todorovic, N., Lepori B., & Rocci A. (2024). Plural conversations about argumentation: A bibliometric and corpus analysis
- Capano, G., & Lepori B. (2024). Designing policies that could work: understanding the interaction between policy design spaces and organizational responses in public sector
- Eldemir P. (2024). A Literature Review on Internationalisation Strategies in Higher Education Institutions
Our research group members include:
Head
Scientific Collaborator
Postdoctoral Researchers
Doctoral Researchers
- Eldemir, Pinar, [email protected]
- Falvo, Ilaria, [email protected]
- Todorovic, Natalija, [email protected]
Research Assistant
- Vicari, Eleonora, [email protected]
