Date: 17 October 2025, 13:00–14:30 

Location: Corvinus University of Budapest, Building E, Room E338 

Online 

Theme and Purpose of the Lecture 

 Editorial boards of academic journals are far from being mere formalities: their composition, operation and decisions fundamentally shape which forms of knowledge become visible in the domestic and international academic arena. In their gatekeeping role, editorial boards determine which research is published in prestigious journals, thereby influencing the development of academic fields, their hierarchies, and their international embeddedness. It is therefore essential to examine who constitutes these bodies, what networks they form, and how they perceive their own responsibilities. 

Rita Hordósy (University of Nottingham) will deliver a lecture on these questions. As part of a research team, she investigates the functioning and networks of editorial boards in sociology and higher education research. (The detailed abstract of the lecture is included at the end of this invitation.) 

Following the lecture, two editors-in-chief will reflect on the Hungarian and disciplinary contexts: Anikó Fehérvári (ELTE), editor-in-chief of Educatio and the Hungarian Educational Research Journal, will comment from the perspective of Hungarian education journals; Márta Aranyossy (Corvinus University of Budapest), editor-in-chief of Vezetéstudomány, will share her insights into the practices and dilemmas of editorial boards in the field of business studies.  

About the Speaker 

Rita Hordósy is a sociologist who has lived in the United Kingdom since 2010 and is currently Associate Professor at the University of Nottingham. Her research lies in international and comparative education, with a particular focus on student experiences in higher education. She completed her doctoral research at the University of Birmingham, where she examined European school-to-work tracking systems. Between 2013 and 2018 she led the longitudinal study Sheffield Student 2013 at the University of Sheffield, exploring the financial, social and academic transitions of a student cohort. In 2018–2019 she taught at the University of Manchester, where she led a study on the career-planning experiences of students in vocational institutions. In 2019 she launched the Research/Teaching Nexus comparative project at the University of Nottingham, investigating the relationship between research and teaching at universities in Hungary, England and Norway. Rita is actively involved in the international research community, including as co-organiser of the Student Access and Experience Network and as editorial board member of Educational Review. 

Further information. 

Programme 

Registration and Further Information 

Participation in the event is free of charge and no prior registration is required. 

Any questions or comments regarding the event may be directed to the organiser, Gergely Kováts, at gergely.kovats@uni-corvinus.hu. 

Venue 

The event will take place in Room E338, Main Building of Corvinus University of Budapest (Fővám tér 8). Participants arriving by car may use the underground car park beneath Building C (entrance from Mátyás Street). 

Online Streaming 

The event will also be streamed online. The access link will be sent to the email address provided at registration. 

This event is organised within the framework of the OTKA research project “Model Change in Higher Education” (grant no. FK138875). 

Abstract of the Lecture 

The oft-quoted aphorism “publish or perish” (Bridges, 2011; Fejes & Nylander, 2014) denotes the well-known relationship between publishing and the acquisition or retention of academic positions, since publication output is a key metric of academic careers. While this knowledge-production system may facilitate the establishment of reputation and access to resources, it does not necessarily guarantee the inclusion of diverse perspectives (Merton, 1968; Brankovic, 2018; Demeter, 2020; Mills, 2023). 

In this lecture, I examine journals in two fields – sociology and higher education research (Brown et al., 2025; Hordósy et al., 2025). By analysing the membership and composition of editorial boards, I reveal the structure and interconnections of journal networks and reflect on how journals articulate their aims and international relevance (Goyanes et al., 2022). The network analysis is complemented by interviews with editorial board members of higher education journals, shedding light on the diversity of editorial practices and strategies. 

The data suggest that the geographical distribution of editorial board memberships is highly concentrated: two-thirds of members, whether serving on a single board or on multiple boards, are affiliated with just three countries – the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. This indicates a significant imbalance in the international publishing ecosystem. Although journals’ stated aims and claims to relevance are largely uniform, with frequent emphasis on global visibility and international significance, the interviews reveal persistent tensions between “quality” and “diversity” in publication strategies. 

Recruitment to editorial boards takes into account multiple considerations: academic reputation, commitment to the field, thematic, conceptual and methodological expertise, alongside personal attributes and geographical diversity. 

These findings raise the fundamental question of how inclusive these scholarly communities are towards contributors from different contexts – whether in terms of authorship in high-ranking journals or editorial board membership (Cummings & Hoebink, 2017; Nyúl et al., 2021; Liu et al., 2023). Is it possible to move away from the current publishing model and the logic of the prestige economy? If so, what would be the implications for researchers, publishers and higher education institutions that are – for the most part – current beneficiaries of the system (Bhopal & Myers, 2023; Demeter, 2020; Aczél et al., 2021; Kwiek, 2021)?