Market Coordination, Research Management and the Future of Higher Education in the Post-Industrial Era

Higher education governance and management cannot be adequately understood outside the context in which they occur. This includes not only intra-institutional dynamics (each somewhat unique), but also the relationship between higher education institutions and the broader social environment. Many of the pressures with which academic managers must cope are not created by themselves, but originate from a number of external social, economic and political demands, often reflected in government policy. In Australia, probably in no other area is the macro-economic reform at the national level - particularly in making the nation more responsive to a global knowledge-based economy - so closely aligned with the micro-management reform at the institutional level than with respect to the management of research.