Research Forum 2003

Gabriel E. Kaplan
University of Colorado, Denver

Does Governance Matter?

Governance has long been a salient subject in the study of higher education. Much of the research focuses on two questions: the need to preserve faculty authority and influence and the need for decision systems that operate seamlessly and reactively to change. Implicit in both these topics is a presumption that the stakes for governance are high because its impact on the decisions that institutions reach is large. Despite an extended body of research that proceeds from this assumption, the underlying validity of the relationship between governance and performance has rarely been examined or challenged. This paper examines the relationship between governance and outcomes at a broad array of American four year institutions. The concept of governance encompasses the explicit, and, occasionally, implicit arrangements by which authority and responsibility for making decisions concerning the institution is allocated to the various parties who participate in it (Hirsch and Weber 2000). In higher education, the governance system consists of “the written and unwritten policies, procedures, and decision making units that control resource allocation within and among institutions” (Benjamin 1993, 5). In this paper, the focus is not on the culture of governance at an institution but on the actual structures that are chosen and implement decisions. The paper uses data from a national survey of governance structures and from financial surveys compiled by the US Department of Education. Using a cross-sectional approach, it assesses the correlation between particular governance structures and outcomes and between the assignment of authority and control over decisions to particular parties and the distribution of benefits to various parties. It finds little relationship between the decisions that are arrived at and the assignment of authority over those decisions. Faculties with significant authority appear to be no more likely to make decisions that favor themselves over others than administrators with significant authority. The paper also finds little relationship between the structures by which governance is implemented such as faculty senates, academic senates, faculty advisory councils and others and the decisions that institutions subsequently implement. Salaries, teaching loads, financial health, and expenditures appear to have little correlation with structures of governance or with the relative influence of parties. The significance of these findings for future research and practice in academic governance is assessed and interpreted.