  We are witnessing a rapid trend towards the adoption of exercises for
evaluation of national research systems, generally based on the peer review
approach. They respond to two main needs: stimulating higher efficiency in
research activities by public laboratories, and realizing better allocative
efficiency in government funding of such institutions. However the peer review
approach is typified by several limitations that raise doubts for the
achievement of the ultimate objectives. In particular, subjectivity of
judgment, which occurs during the step of selecting research outputs to be
submitted for the evaluations, risks heavily distorting both the final ratings
of the organizations evaluated and the ultimate funding they receive. These
distortions become ever more relevant if the evaluation is limited to small
samples of the scientific production of the research institutions. The
objective of the current study is to propose a quantitative methodology based
on bibliometric data that would provide a reliable support for the process of
selecting the best products of a laboratory, and thus limit distortions.
Benefits are twofold: single research institutions can maximize the probability
of receiving a fair evaluation coherent with the real quality of their
research. At the same time, broader adoptions of this approach could also
provide strong advantages at the macroeconomic level, since it guarantees
financial allocations based on the real value of the institutions under
evaluation. In this study, the proposed methodology has been applied to the
hard science sectors of the Italian university research system for the period
2004-2006.
