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Structural Inequality in Collaboration Networks

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2022

Rafael Ventura Open the ORCID record for Rafael Ventura [Opens in a new window]
Rafael Ventura*
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania, 112 Leidy Labs, 3740 Hamilton Walk, Philadelphia, 19104 PA, United States
*
E-mail: rventura@upenn.edu
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Abstract

Recent models of scientific collaboration show that minorities can end up at a disadvantage in bargaining scenarios. However, these models presuppose the existence of social categories. Here, I present a model of scientific collaboration in which inequality arises in the absence of social categories. I assume that all agents are identical except for the position that they occupy in the collaboration network. I show that inequality arises in the absence of social categories. I also show that this is due to the structure of the collaboration network and that similar patterns arise in two real-world collaboration networks.

Type
Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 90 , Issue 2 , April 2023 , pp. 336 - 353
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Philosophy of Science Association

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