Tourism publications as newly tradeable commodities: Academic performance, prestige, power, competition, constraints and consents

Abstract

The politically powerful Academic Ranking of World Universities now includes tourism ranks and scores, calculated as sums of university-total weighted square-root ratios of four publication parameters. The algorithm is capable of local pairwise computational solutions. Publications are more valuable to lower-ranked universities, despite similar production costs. This creates opportunities for arbitrage, and pressures for trade and purchase. Currently, universities purchase publications through indirect mechanisms such as fractional, emeritus, adjunct, and visiting appointments and affiliations. Countries and universities that adopted systems for direct purchase of articles between universities would gain a significant competitive advantage. The most immediate opportunity, with no legal or ethical barriers, is for pay-per-article contracts with newly-retired but still productive tourism professors.