Local reach, global significance? The politics of scale and the competing imaginaries of the UK research impact agenda

One of the often-criticised aspects of the impact agenda in the UK is its narrow understanding of research impact, particularly in terms of the geographical reach. Local impact is indeed one of the most under-reported categories of the REF impact. This omission is significant as it has important consequences for the practices of knowledge production and use, including political (e.g. knowledge supply to local governments), strategic (e.g. the role of universities in local communities) and equity (e.g. elite-facing knowledge work) considerations. This paper aims to critically unpack the causes and consequences of the geographical bias of the REF impact agenda by mobilising conceptual tools from the field of human geography, in particular, the notion of the ‘scale’ as a socially constructed phenomenon. Drawing on interviews with academics, experts and policymakers involved in impact activities, this paper unpacks the meanings and practices behind ‘local’, ‘national’ and ‘international’ impact. The paper explores how actors collapse, stretch, or reframe ‘scale’ of their impact to meet competing demands—invoking local importance and the civic university ideal on one hand, and positioning themselves as globally excellent on the other. The paper argues that the Research Excellence Framework, as a performative policy instrument, reproduces scalar hierarchies by implicitly rewarding impact with broader geographic reach. Therefore, the analysis of the politics of scale of research impact sheds light on the broader phenomenon of unintended consequences of research assessment by unveiling the mechanisms behind the discrepancies between research assessment guidelines and their enactments in measurement practice.