Rankings of Tourism and Hospitality Departments: A Case of Turkey

Although there has been a long tradition of ranking departments on the basis of research productivity, this phenomenon is relatively new in tourism research. This paper develops a conceptualized ranking scheme of academic programs which was tested through following a five-step ranking approach and using both objective and subjective measures. The study findings indicate that some departments drift away from the league table while the position of top departments does not really change from one approach to another. The study findings also support the proposition that there is a strong consistency between reputation rankings of the quality of departments and their overall ranking. Despite the general similarity in the reputation and cumulative weighted rankings, there is noteworthy discrepancy that some departments rate much higher in the reputation ranking than in the objective ranking. Some other departments receive a lower perceived ranking than they receive from objective measures. The paper suggests both theoretical and practical implications.