The recruitment of university top leaders: Politics, communities and markets in interaction

Lars Engwall

Scandinavian Journal of Management, 2014, vol. 30, issue 3, 332-343

Abstract: In modern society academic institutions attract an increasing amount of attention as providers of education and innovation. While such institutions were earlier largely governed by the academic community itself, they are nowadays increasingly subject to external forces. This paper therefore focuses on the changing character of the interaction between the academic community, politics and markets as it is manifested in the recruitment of Vice-Chancellors. It is hypothesized that these recruitments can be expected to have changed – earlier and more noticeably among young institutions – towards increasing (1) external recruitments, (2) emphasis on managerial rather than academic credentials, (3) recruitments from the natural and life sciences, (4) recruitments of females, and (5) turnover. The hypotheses are confronted with data regarding the 165 recruitments of VCs that have occurred in the Swedish universities and university colleges since the 1960s. The analysis lends support to the hypotheses.

Keywords: Academic leadership; Governance; Universities; Managerialism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1016/j.scaman.2013.12.005

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