Abstract
Institutions of higher education, especially universities, have undergone a gradual transformation in the last 20 years or so under the pressures of accountability-related measures such as the research assessment exercise, quality assurance procedures, outcomes-based teaching and learning, and the university rankings system. These measures have led academic institutions to adopt practices that emphasize corporate management concerns. Universities are no longer regarded as institutions of learning but more as corporate enterprise. One aspect of this transformation is also seen in the implementation of staff appraisal systems and promotion exercises, which are becoming increasingly formal and less transparent, often operating behind closed doors, and privileging increased power to decision-makers. There is a resulting danger of policies and procedures being designed, constructed, and interpreted to assign maximum control to decision-makers over the outcome of such processes. This paper presents analysis of a corpus of policies, rules, and procedures being used in a number of institutions of higher education, focusing on the issues of transparency, power and control in academic appraisals and promotions, to study the extent to which these rules and procedures are likely to make the exercise transparent and assign equitable power and control to the decision-makers as well as to the staff at the receiving end.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Chen, Rong, and Sunny Hyon. 2005. Faculty evaluation as a genre system: Negotiating intertextuality and interpersonality. Journal of Applied Linguistics 2(2): 153–184.
Coaldrake, Peter, and Lawrence Stedman. 1999. Academic work in the twenty-first century: Changing roles and policies. Occasional Paper Series, Higher Education Division, Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs, Commonwealth of Australia.
Connell, Julia, and John Nolan. 2004. Managing performance: Modern day myth or a game people play. International Journal of Employment Studies 12(1): 43–63.
Curtis, Bruce. 2007. Academic life: Commodification, continuity, collegiality, confusion and the performance based research fund. New Zealand Journal of Employment Relations 32(2): 1–16.
Czarniawska, Barbara, and Kristina Genell. 2002. Going shopping? Universities on their way to the market. Scandinavian Journal of Management 18: 455–474.
Enders, Jürgen. 2001. A chair system in transition: Appointments, promotions and gate-keeping in German higher education. Higher Education 41: 3–25.
Fletcher, Clive. 2001. Performance appraisal and management: The developing research agenda. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 74: 473–487.
Gabris, Gerald, and Douglas Ihrke. 2000. Improving employee acceptance toward performance appraisal and merit pay systems: The role of leadership credibility. Review of Public Personnel Administration Winter 2000: 41–53.
Hare, Paul. 2003. The United Kingdom’s research assessment exercise: Impact on institutions, departments, individuals. Higher Education Management and Policy 15(2): 43–62.
Henkel, Mary. 1997. Academic values and the university as corporate enterprise. Higher Education Quarterly 51(2): 134–143.
Henkel, Mary. 1998. Evaluation in higher education: Conceptual and epistemological foundations. European Journal of Education 33(3): 285–297.
Miller, Lindsay, and Jean Young. 2007. What’s in it for me? A performance management system to please everyone. In Evaluating teacher effectiveness in ESL/EFL contexts, ed. Christine Coombe, Mashael Al-Hamly, Peter Davidson, and Salah Troudi, 74–88. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
Morris, Leanne, Pauline Stanton, and Suzanne Young. 2007. Performance management in higher education—development versus control. New Zealand Journal of Employment Relations 32(2): 17–30.
Parker, Martin, and David Jary. 1995. The McUniversity: Organization, management and academic subjectivity. Organization 2(2): 319–338.
Power, Michael. 1997. The audit society: Rituals of verification. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ritzer, George. 1993. The McDonaldization of society. Newbury Park, CA: Pine Forge.
Shattock, Michael. 2000. The academic profession in Britain: A study in the failure to adapt to change. In The changing academic workplace: Comparative perspectives, ed. Philip Altbach, 61–84. Chestnut Hill, MA: Lynch School of Education.
Swales, John. 2004. Research genres: Exploration and applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Vidal, Javier, and José-Ginés Mora. 2003. Evaluating teaching and research activities—finding the right balance. Higher Education Management and Policy 15(2): 73–81.
Witte, Stephen. 1992. Context, text, intertext: Toward a constructionist semiotic of writing. Written Communication 9(2): 237–308.
Acknowledgments
This article evolved from a presentation given by the author and Professor Vijay Bhatia at the 8th International Roundtable for the Semiotics of Law in December 2009 at City University of Hong Kong. My thanks go to Professor Bhatia for being the inspiration behind the original paper, and for his insights and advice.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Bremner, S. Academic Institutions as Corporate Enterprise: Transparency, Power and Control in Staff Appraisal. Int J Semiot Law 24, 147–161 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-010-9202-9
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-010-9202-9