According to this site, the U.S. has close to 300 million people; the U.K. has about 60 million (64 million if you add Ireland, though we have not had occasion to include Irish departments in the surveys to date, though some rank in the specialty areas); Canada has about 33 million; and Australia and New Zealand have about 24 million. We rank the top 50 in the US and, being the philosophical scene I know best, it seems to me that all the programs in the top 50 have real strengths and ought to be ranked and flagged for prospective students. Is quality of programs in other countries proportional to population size? If so, then should we rank just the top 10 in the UK (instead of 15), the top 5 in Canada (instead of 10), and the top 4 in Australasia (instead of 5). (We would, of course, include more than 10, 5 and 4 in the surveys, just as we include more than 50 US departments in the surveys.)
What to readers think? Any change, if there is one, will be voted on by the Advisory Board, but I'm curious to hear what readers think. No anonymous posts.
