University Governance Within an International Context
This chapter introduces corporate and academic governance within universities before setting out a synthesis of historical changes in university governance within each of the UK, the US and Australia. It concludes with a discussion of general trends in hi
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University Governance Within an International Context
Abstract This chapter introduces corporate and academic governance within universities before setting out a synthesis of historical changes in university governance within each of the UK, the US and Australia. It concludes with a discussion of general trends in higher education governance highlighting a consolidation of power and an expansion of scope within the office of the vice-chancellor (also known as the principal or president) and his or her executive team. The chapter concludes by noting concern that strong central control risks removing authority over academic matters from those currently practising teaching and research. This is a key challenge for academic governance that is evident across Anglophone nations.
Academic and Corporate Governance Within Universities The Anglo-Saxon model of university governance has its origins in mediaeval Europe within the University of Paris, founded in 1090, as a guild by scholars or masters ‘to provide a place for them to pursue their scholarship’ (Boggs 2010, p. 223). In contrast to the governance structures adopted by some other early European universities, such as the University of Bologna within which students had control of the university and employed the teaching professors (Rüegg 1992), within the University of Paris students were permitted to learn from the masters in return for payment of a fee but did not generally play a part in its governance (Boggs 2010). The centrality of the academic voice within the governance structure of the University of Paris was confirmed in 1213 when: … the chancellor issued a Magna Charter of the University of Paris, confirmed by the Pope in 1231, that he was obliged to obtain the vote of the professors in matters connected with appointments for the teaching of theology and canon law. (Shattock 2006, p. 1 citing Rüegg 1992)
The governance structure of the University of Paris was adopted by Oxford upon its establishment from 1096, the first of the English universities, and subsequently by Cambridge, and it ‘remained the only university governance type in England for © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2017 J. Rowlands, Academic Governance in the Contemporary University, DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-2688-1_2
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four hundred years’ (Boggs 2010, p. 3). It later formed the basis for governance structures within the US and other former British colonies (Shattock 2006). Thus, notions of university governance are steeped in history and are inextricably linked with the evolution of universities themselves (Shattock 2006). However within Anglophone nations, in contrast to continental European universities traditionally more closely aligned with the state and with academics employed as civil servants, universities in the US, UK and Australia have: … historically competed with one another for the best staff and students, have seen autonomy and self-government as a key to the development of institutional strategy and have had the pri
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