The International Association of Universities (IAU) is the only inclusive global university association, its membership barriers are low, yet few universities are members despite considerable benefits. What determines membership in this long-standing international university alliance? Reviewing recent trends toward a more networked, stratified and internationalized global higher education field, we argue that universities with a greater need for legitimation and those ‘born’ into a global era are more likely to become members of an inclusive international network like the IAU. Thus, we expect lower status and younger universities to be more likely to join. We apply regression models to test hypotheses implied by these arguments. Our findings are consistent with these hypotheses, even after controlling for other factors. We discuss these findings using neo-institutional arguments about legitimacy and imprinted logics and suggest potential analytical avenues for further research.

中文翻译：

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全球高等教育的合法性、分层与国际化：以国际大学协会为例

国际大学协会（IAU）是唯一的包容性全球大学协会，其成员门槛低，但尽管收益可观，但很少有大学成为成员。是什么决定了这个长期国际大学联盟的成员资格？回顾最近全球高等教育领域更加网络化、分层和国际化的趋势，我们认为，对合法性有更大需求的大学和那些“出生”在全球时代的大学更有可能成为像 IAU 这样的包容性国际网络的成员。因此，我们预计地位较低和较年轻的大学更有可能加入。我们应用回归模型来检验这些论点所隐含的假设。我们的发现与这些假设一致，即使在控制了其他因素之后也是如此。