This brief overview of the discourse on the changing nature of the values systems held by universities and the related institutional change arose out of the initial 2008 stage of grounded theory research on university values and value in the case study institution. The literature on institutional change is extremely broad and is therefore covered in limited detail, noting that a discussion of institutional change is embedded in the literature on techno-‐‑economic paradigms and
revolutions discussed above.
Clark (1972) builds a theory of organizational saga to express the bonds and sense of community and inclusiveness built up over generations, for internal and external groups associated with, in this case, three universities. This is the
organizational saga of loyalty and community. The value of this theorization is that, as with the perceived value of grounded theory (Kenny & Fourie, 2014), the theory survives for a very long time, even where the context, environment and era changes. But not all organizational sagas in universities are about loyalty, community and shared histories. As Clark suggests, some organizational sagas include exclusion or at least perceptions of exclusion. Using this theory of organizational saga, researchers could create an organizational saga for
university positioning. This thesis addresses itself to the emergent strategies in positioning the university with respect to its research activeness or research intensiveness, the part of the cultural life of the institution that is most clearly connected into the broader innovation system.
Clark (2001) focuses on the reinterpretation of historical values, one could say the repurposing of the historical values of collegiality, autonomy and achievement (or success or academic excellence) from an era of management for an era of entrepreneurialism. Central to this article is the question: “How can we, in our setting, position our organisation to best pursue opportunities? And keep, we
might add, the underlying values that characterize universities” (Clark, 2001, p.17). While the question is posed as a general question, and is thus very similar to the research question posed in this thesis, the context for Clark’s (2001) question is the transition from the collegial university or the distinctive college with its own organizational saga to the entrepreneurial university. In this thesis, the context for the research question is the complexity encountered when
attempting to pursue research activeness and research intensiveness of various kinds, which certainly includes the possibilities of entrepreneurial science, but is not occupied with that particular endeavor alone. Furthermore, in this thesis the elaboration of academic values extends beyond the repurposing of historical values to include additional values. He pursues an extensive discussion on university change and which kinds of universities, under what circumstances, may best adapt to change.
Smith and Webster (1997: pp.1–14) discuss contested visions of higher education noting the broad range of “changing ideas of the university” in Britain and Europe. They summarise the discourse and debate in their edited collection that at one stage in its history, the university had a main unifying theme, namely that of a community of scholars engaged in knowledge transfer and production in a historical context in which there were no competing institutions making
knowledge claims; while in the current era it is a set of different types of institutions, characterised by difference both vertically and horizontally within institutions, and is an environment of “mutual contestation of knowledges” (Smith & Webster, p.5). Some authors show that this contestation can have beneficial effects for universities. For example, Gulbrandsen and Smeby argued, based on a study of all university professors in Norway, that industrial funding appears to encourage increased research intensiveness (Gulbrandsen & Smeby, 2005, p.932):
…they collaborate more with other researchers both in academia and in industry, and they report more scientific publications as well as more frequent
between academic publishing and entrepreneurial outputs.
Similarly, van Looy, Ranga, Callaert, Debackere and Zimmermann (2004) made the claim that entrepreneurial and scientific performance are reciprocal rather than contending forces in academia. However, Olsen (2005) notes the many challenges for the European university, including that actors may have shared or conflicting objectives with respect to university “autonomy”, a key concept in the academic values literature. He recognises four main governance perspectives for the European university: a self-‐‑governing community of scholars, an instrument for national political agendas, a representative democracy, a service enterprise embedded in competitive markets. He engages with the possibility that any particular university may, at any point in time, occupy all these “positions” simultaneously, with one or another position being dominant. He points to several dilemmas – proliferation of identities, individual freedom, access to resources, renewal and continuity. The most relevant part of this work is the inductive argument that “institutional success may also carry the seeds of institutional confusion, crisis and change” (Olsen, 2005, p. 39):
Historically, universities have survived by turning institutional confusion and crisis into reexamination, search, innovation and rejuvenation. There is no
guarantee it will happen again. Developments will, as before, depend upon many factors the University cannot control. What the University can do is to critically re-‐‑examine its self-‐‑understanding as an academic institution: its purposes, core values and principles, its organization and governance systems, its resources and friends, and its social obligations.
Howell and Annasingh (2013, p.38) discussed the cultural transformation of the university with respect to knowledge generation and dissemination, noting that internal and external influences can create “a critical juncture … (of) internal and external pressures to develop beyond the original path-‐‑dependency”. This would mean that universities are not bound to act out their historical trajectory. The most in-‐‑depth treatment of such critical junctures was found in Barnett (2000), who argued that the world of the university had become super-‐‑complex because it was confronted with a range of metanarratives, (or grand theories or large
stories of the world), which those interest could choose between or attempt to accommodate side by side (2000: pp.75–83). He argued that in a super-‐‑complex world of large stories of the university, there might be different large stories for different segments or different functions of the institution. This is an influential idea for this thesis.
Pinheiro, Geschwind and Aarrevaara (2014) observe the prevalence of Olsen’s (2007) dilemmas in Nordic countries, (i) internal tensions over matters such as the appropriate balance between equity and excellence (ii) governance
arrangements pertaining to centralization versus autonomy (iii) funding and resource matters and their effect on the relative independence and academic freedom of the university mission from external capture and (iv) the interplay between change and continuity and the effects of path dependencies. The article notes a range of tensions and dilemmas, including in the areas of governance, managerialism, funding and financial autonomy, government and regulatory pressures. It argues that these tensions and dilemmas are interconnected in Nordic universities, as previously argued by Olsen (2007) with respect to European universities.
Institutional change theory includes examination of organisational complexity (Gupta, 2006), transforming organisations (Kochan & Useem, 1992), management in the 21st century (Chowdury, 2000) and reshaping the university (Barnett, 2005). The most relevant of these many theories and theoretical toolboxes was the consideration of large-‐‑scale change (Kotter & Cohen, 2002, p.1-‐‑14), which argued that:
People change what they do less because they are given an analysis that shifts their thinking than because they are shown a truth that influences their feelings. This is especially so in large-‐‑scale change, when you are dealing with new technologies, mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, new strategies, cultural transformation, globalization, and e-‐‑business – whether in an entire
organization…or a group. In an age of turbulence, when you handle this reality well, you win. Handle it poorly, and it can…cause a lot of pain.
This perspective was influential in the thinking that underlies the research design for this thesis, because of the interest in the intangible aspects of the university shift away from its historical path dependency.
While Barnett writes from a historical view of the evolution of the medieval university to the post-‐‑modern university and Etzkowitz writes from the historical view of the American land grant colleges evolving into ‘entrepreneurial
universities’, the common view expressed is of a new university paradigm, no, multiple new paradigms co-‐‑existing, from which academics and university managers can choose between or attempt to accommodate more than one. As Barnett states (2000: p.21):
In this, its post-‐‑modern realization, the university lacks specificity; it is a set of possibilities, to be realized or not partly through the fortune presented by the external world. And hence the positioning: we never know what will turn up in the world, so let’s be ready for it when it comes. Here, then, we have a glimpse of a new way of understanding the university: no longer a site of knowledge as such but, rather, a site of knowledge possibilities.
Barnett proposes the following six conditions for reinventing the university: critical inter-‐‑disciplinarity, collective self-‐‑scrutiny, purposive renewal, moving borders, engagement and communicative tolerance (2000: pp.103–109). Barnett does not, however, review the university in an emerging economy context, where particular metanarratives are used or have begun to unfold.
Melody (2002: p.9) takes a bold stance and argues that higher education
institutions are increasingly being recognised as businesses of a special type and that, rather than shying away from this view, universities should adopt their own business models relevant to the particular nature of their evolving business needs and interactions.
Higher education researchers on other continents echo the analyses documented by Barnett and Etzkowitz. In Networking Knowledge for Information Societies:
Institutions and Interventions, Sheehan (2002, p.33) discusses the Australian situation:
We have barely begun to address the place of the university in the knowledge-‐‑ based society, where knowledge is at the heart of economic and social affairs and, hence, also the focus of the ambitions of individuals, companies and
governments. While trading on the cherished ideal, most universities have developed into quite different institutions, where the pressure of teaching, fundraising, administration, publication and competition make a mockery of the disinterested search for truth … Many of us, at least outside the United States, are struggling within university institutions that have lost their way in the welter of conflicting demands, expectations and vested interests. To sort through these problems, and to preserve some space for the historic ideal, will require both clear thinking and committed action.
Juma, writing from the experience of the African Virtual University (2003, p.207) argues that:
For sub-‐‑Saharan Africa to participate actively in the global economy and to solve its many social, technology and political problems, it has to invest in education in order to build its capabilities in the fields of science, technology and business.
These references and quotations establish some of the key features of higher education in the knowledge economy as fundamental to country
competitiveness, as activity in a realm of super-‐‑complexity, as a contestation for a new ideal world, and as a necessity for emerging economies and economic regions to grow socially and economically. Universities in South Africa, India and other emerging economies will experience, take on board and do duel with all these features as the external world impacts on the institution without regard for its limits and constraints.