Advantages and dangers of ‘remote’ peer evaluation

Under conditions of an increasing scarcity of reviewer time, a ‘remote peer review’ of research organisations — conducted without meetings between assessors or with the assessed academics at their institution — might be an easier and cheaper solution. This paper explores the impact of ‘remoteness’ on the practices of reviewers by analysing the recent Quality Review of the Australian National University. A taylorisation of the review process was observed that split the roles of designing the process, assessing the research, synthesising results, and taking responsibility for the outcome of the assessment. This taylorisation of the assessment process, the heterogeneity of individual assessment practices, and the low availability of publications in electronic format led to the conclusion that further organisational innovations are necessary in order to make remote peer reviews feasible. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.