Search

The political, social, and institutional environments in which contemporary universities operate have changed rather dramatically over the past two decades in ways that threaten the resilience of the academic core, both in its ability to map knowledge comprehensively and also to maintain a balance between the branches of the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. This paper traces historical changes (2003–2019) in the academic core of two "flagship" research-intensive universities located in Northern Europe. The results show that some branches of the academic core are undergoing dynamic processes of program churn that make them resilient. Furthermore, the data show that this resilience is enabled in large part by bridging different branches of knowledge by establishing what we term interbranch programs. In addition to the abovementioned findings, the paper links ongoing discussions regarding change in HE systems and institutions to the literature on organizational resilience, and it advances insights for a possible future theory of how adaptation plays out in the academic core over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the emergence and early institutionalization of competition in higher education (HE), specifically in business schools. First, building on key contributions from economics, management studies, sociology, and HE research, we develop propositions on competition in HE and formulate our theoretical framework. Second, we apply this framework to explore competition in Finnish business schools. We argue that business schools constitute an interesting field for studying competition in HE because they are the frontrunners and champions of competition-based views in HE. Our main contribution is a novel explanation of the preconditions, emergence, and early processes of institutionalization that drive HE institutions to compete and collectively produce the observed competitive transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the accountability mechanisms introduced in the universities in the Nordic countries by building on a typology of accountability types. By utilising survey data, it analyses how academics experience the changes in accountability mechanisms and how they perceive the impact of these changes on their performance. The analysis shows that especially political/bureaucratic and managerial accountability demands have been strengthened. This development has fostered debates on how to measure academic performance. Some academics, more in Denmark than in the other countries, have experienced the development as a sign of mistrust. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents introduction which talks about talks about the multi-campus systems and the rise in enrollment of students into multi-campus addition to U.S. and multi-campus universities and Great Britain and South Africa and Australia and Mozambique.

Multi-campus universities are not a new phenomenon per se, but they have become an increasing feature of contemporary higher education systems all over the world. In the case of Northern Europe, multi-campus universities are the consequence of contraction patterns resulting from overcapacity, fragmentation and rising competition. This paper has two main objectives. First, to take stock of the existing scientific literature on multi-campus universities and, on that basis, develop a novel conceptual framework for categorizing such systems, with focus on the level of autonomy and profile enjoyed by the individual campuses composing a given system or university. Second, we provide new empirical insights as a way of testing and contextualizing our conceptual model, by drawing upon a case university located in the Nordic countries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper investigates historical and current developments regarding governmental policies aimed at enhancing spatial equity (access) or decentralisation of higher education provision in three countries-Australia, Canada and Norway. We then shed light on the links or interrelations between policy objectives and initiatives and institutional diversity and regional development more broadly. We found evidence of convergence trends in Norway and Canada resulting in the rise of hybrid organisational forms, as well as the critical importance of policy frameworks in either maintaining or eroding the traditional binary divide. The cross-country data suggest a rather mixed or nuanced picture when it comes to regional development. Finally, the paper identifies a number of key challenges facing the systems, suggests possible ways of tackling them and sheds light on avenues for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Access to higher education has become a key policy issue in most European countries in since the last half of the last century. We trace the historical development of the ways in which governments in two countries within the region, Norway and Poland, have attempted to steer developments. Three access waves or phases are identified and contextualized, by illuminating dominant policy logics and tensions. Our analysis suggests that 'coping with the flow' reflects a continuous attempt to instrumentalize higher education and make it serve different political goals: equity, efficiency, and responsiveness. As for the institutions, these have either resisted or embraced government-led initiatives while protecting their institutional autonomy. We show empirical evidence of the fact that the two countries have undergone similar waves and policy measures, yet these have resulted in distinct institutional responses due to national peculiarities, history, local politics, and deeply rooted academic traditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Becoming an entrepreneurial university has been identified as the solution to the problems facing contemporary higher education systems. The idea of becoming an entrepreneurial university can be seen as the result of a more globalised higher education sector where the domestic and institution-specific characteristics of universities are downplayed in favour of a more uniform idea of what a university should do and how it should be organized. This article contributes to this scholarly discussion by analysing how efforts to transform universities into 'more complete organisations' are understood and interpreted in terms of organisational structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Norway, the higher education landscape is undergoing profound transformation. This process is being driven by a number of factors, including demography, competition and academic aspirations, with many so-called “university-colleges” aspiring to become fully-fledged universities. We shed light on the dynamics of one such institution, the recently established University of Agder, by posing three questions: what drove internal actors to attain full university status and what immediate effects have been felt across the university? What are the needs and expectations of regional constituencies? What types of university models have internal actors been working with? Conceptually, the article builds on the notion of the university as an organization and institution. The findings, which have implications for both theory and practice, suggest that the case university is attempting to find a balance between its global and local aspirations, but that it faces a number of challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]