Gate-keepers or judges: Peer reviews in construction management

Peer review has a momentous influence upon the lives of those who seek to publish, upon the credibility of an academic discipline and upon the way it develops. It is used widely within the academic community on the assumption that it encourages high standards of scholarly writing by providing an informed, fair, reasonable and professional opinion about the merits of research work. This paper reports an experiment which tested the extent to which peer review in construction management serves this function. The results indicate that the outcome of the peer review process is not significantly different from random, and that there is little consistency in the reasons advanced for rejection or revision.