Evaluation of Research, Journals, and Universities in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region According to the Scimago Classification of Administration and Economics Specializations : A Comparative Study with Neighboring Countries

The aim of study is to determine the level of researchers, the quality of published research, and the quality of journals in the fields of administration and economics, using indicators from the Scimago journal and country Rank (SJR) and the Scimago Institutions Rankings (SIR), which is based on the Scopus database of the Dutch publishing house Elsevier for Iraq in comparison to neighboring countries (Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan and Syria) in terms of the number of published research, total citations, citations per publication which reflects the quality of scientific research and refereed scientific journals for three different time periods, including for a period of (24) years over the period (1996-2020) and for a period of (18) years after the year (2002) and for the year (2020) only, and the number of academic journals and universities classified for the year (2021) for Iraq using the descriptive and quantitative method of academic journals over the period (1996-2020). The study concludes that, with the exception of Syria, research output, academic journals, and universities in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region fall behind neighboring nations. Also, this study suggests that higher education and educational authorities should update regulations and directions to motivate Iraqi researchers and universities to publish according to the prominent databases such as Scopus