The Times Higher Education World University Rankings' Social Sciences table judges world class universities across all of their core missions - teaching, research, knowledge transfer and international outlook. The ranking of the world's top 50 universities for social sciences employs 13 carefully calibrated performance indicators to provide the most comprehensive and balanced comparisons available, which are trusted by students, academics, university leaders, industry and governments.

Top 50 social sciences universities

Rank Institution Location Overall score
1 Stanford University United States
93.9
2 Harvard University United States
93.5
3 University of Oxford United Kingdom
92.2
4 University of Chicago United States
91.7
5 Princeton University United States
91.5
6 Yale University United States
89.9
7 University of Michigan United States
89.4
8 University of California, Los Angeles United States
88.4
8 University College London United Kingdom
88.4
8 University of Pennsylvania United States
88.4
11 University of Cambridge United Kingdom
86.8
12 University of Wisconsin-Madison United States
85.9
13 University of California, Berkeley United States
85.4
14 Northwestern University United States
84.8
15 London School of Economics and Political Science United Kingdom
84.5
16 University of British Columbia Canada
83.7
17 Duke University United States
82.9
18 University of Toronto Canada
80.7
18 Australian National University Australia
80.7
20 Cornell University United States
78.4
21 University of Minnesota United States
78.3
22 University of Texas at Austin United States
77.5
23 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill United States
77.1
24 McGill University Canada
76.7
25 University of Melbourne Australia
74.3
26 University of Washington United States
73.2
27 The University of Hong Kong Hong Kong
72.7
28 University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign United States
71.7
29 Ohio State University United States
71.3
30 Peking University China
70.1
31 University of Manchester United Kingdom
68.2
32 Carnegie Mellon University United States
67.4
33 Washington University in St Louis United States
66.7
34 Brown University United States
66.3
35 Indiana University United States
64.9
36 King's College London United Kingdom
64.7
37 Michigan State University United States
63.6
38 University of Warwick United Kingdom
63.0
39 University of Sydney Australia
62.9
40 University of Tokyo Japan
62.6
40 University of Amsterdam Netherlands
62.6
42 University of Queensland Australia Australia
62.3
43 University of New South Wales Australia
61.7
44 Dartmouth College United States
61.6
45 Durham University United Kingdom
61.5
45 University of Maryland, College Park United States
61.5
47 National University of Singapore Singapore
61.1
48 University of California, Santa Barbara United States
61.0
49 University of Virginia United States
60.9
50 University of Edinburgh United Kingdom
60.6

Social Sciences Rankings: For many issues, only one language

17 November 2011

The social sciences subject table is utterly dominated by the English-speaking world.

The US takes 28 of the 50 places, followed by the UK with nine, Australia with five and Canada with three.

That leaves only five places for the rest of the world in a broad subject that encompasses business, communication, economics, education, geography, law, international relations and much more.

The table features nine countries, with just one institution apiece from the Netherlands, China, Singapore, Japan and Hong Kong.

Stanford University, joint second with Harvard University in the overall top 200 rankings, takes top spot in the social sciences table.

The institution has a strong record of producing leading economists and boasts several living Nobel economics laureates among its world-class faculty.

These include 1992 winner Gary Becker from Stanford's famous Hoover Institution and his colleague Douglass North, who shared the Nobel the following year for his work on economic history and institutional change.

Mainland China's sole representative in the top 50 is Peking University (30th).

While much recent research investment in China has gone into applied science subjects, Peking has focused on maintaining its centuries-old strength in social science disciplines, especially economics and law.

It has a 1,100-strong teaching staff in its School of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Mainland Europe's only representative is the University of Amsterdam (joint 40th), one of the Netherlands' premier higher education institutions.

Its Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences hosts two of the university's 15 research priorities - urban studies and brain and cognition - designated by the institution as areas of world-class excellence to be nurtured.