Wikipedia ranking of world universities

J. Lages (1) , Antoine Patt (1) , Dima Shepelyansky (2)

1 UTINAM - Univers, Transport, Interfaces, Nanostructures, Atmosphère et environnement, Molécules (UMR 6213)
2 ICQ - Cohérence Quantique (LPT)

We use the directed networks between articles of 24 Wikipedia language editions for producing the wikipedia ranking of world Universities (WRWU) using PageRank, 2DRank and CheiRank algorithms. This approach allows to incorporate various cultural views on world universities using the mathematical statistical analysis independent of cultural preferences. The Wikipedia ranking of top 100 universities provides about 60% overlap with the Shanghai university ranking demonstrating the reliable features of this approach. At the same time WRWU incorporates all knowledge accumulated at 24 Wikipedia editions giving stronger highlights for historically important universities leading to a different estimation of efficiency of world countries in university education. The historical development of university ranking is analyzed during ten centuries of their history.

Mots clés: complex networks; University governance; Markov Process; PageRank algorithm; CheiRank algorithm; 2DRank algorithm

Domaines: Complexité [cs.CC]

J. Lages, Antoine Patt, Dima Shepelyansky. Wikipedia ranking of world universities. The European Physical Journal B: Condensed Matter and Complex Systems, 2016, 89, pp.69. ⟨10.1140/epjb/e2016-60922-0⟩. ⟨hal-01288986⟩