If uni rankings are useful at all, it's not on reputation. We could use rankings on (say) % of students on financial aid; % of faculty tenured or tenure-track; % of tenured faculty who are women, minorities; ratio of teachers to administrators; ratio of avg faculty salary to head football coach salary…
From Chris Brink: "It is not difficult to construct a university ranking. What is needed is not so much any technical skill as enough blind self-confidence to tell the world that the arbitrary choices you have made in constructing your ranking actually represent reality." https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231024130858697
Freedom House has kicked off promotion for the launch of the 2023 #FreedomOnTheNet ranking on 4 Oct.
As a primer, have a look at our recent article with @tanyalokot on how competing rankings have shaped global understandings of what internet freedom is (and isn't)
We adopt a relational approach to explain how & why such a complex landscape of internet freedom rankings has emerged and identify how the ranking organisations’ varying approaches to capturing internet freedom have played a role in defining and legitimating it as a global issue.