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Perceived fairness of faculty governance: a study of 51 countries

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Abstract

The present research considers the possibility that guidelines emphasizing academic freedom and faculty self-governance (i.e., those articulated by AAUP and UNESCO) might compete against national norms in shaping faculty fairness perceptions of institutional policies. We investigate the extent to which expectations of academic freedom and faculty self-governance are universal across countries. Grounding our hypotheses in tenets of organizational justice, we assess faculty’s perceptions of academic freedom, hiring, tenure/contract renewal, promotion, and performance appraisal policies. Survey data were collected from 954 faculty members working at institutions of higher education in 51 countries. Results suggest that institutional policies that comply with academic freedom and faculty self-governance guidelines are perceived as fairer than policies that do not comply. Furthermore, the strength of the relationships between fairness and academic freedom, promotion, and performance appraisal policies does not differ between countries. However, our findings do indicate country-level differences in the strength of the relationship between fairness and policies regarding hiring and tenure/contract renewal. We discuss the implications of our findings for university policy. Balancing adherence to fair employment practices, respecting academic freedom, and honoring cultural norms require institutes of higher education worldwide to make difficult decisions. Our research suggests that when designing policies and practices related to the recruitment, hiring, and promotion of faculty, higher education administrators consider the expectations of academic freedom and faculty self-governance.

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Data Availability

Data is available from the first author upon request.

Code availability

SPSS, AMOS, and HLM software programs were used for the analyses conducted in this paper.

Notes

  1. In line with organizational justice literature, we use terms fairness and justice interchangeably (Colquitt & Rodell, 2015).

  2. We deliberately focus on variance based on country or national context, not cultural dimension, because IHEs in the same country tend to be governed similarly (see Altbach, 2001; Locke et al., 2011 for similar approaches to research in higher education). Furthermore, given the differences in governance structures, we focus on colleges and universities that offer bachelor’s degrees or higher, as opposed to those that cater to vocational training.

  3. We considered controlling for age and years working at current institution but we did not include them in the final analysis as these variables were not correlated with the variables of interest (see Spector & Brannick, 2011).

  4. Industry tenure was not included in level-2 as there is no theoretical or empirical reason to believe that its relationship to the dependent variables would change based on country.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank D. Anthony (Tony) Butterfield, Ph.D., Department of Management, University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Craig S. Wells, Ph.D., Department of Education, University of Massachusetts Amherst, for their feedback on earlier versions of this manuscript. The authors would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their help in strengthening this work.

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  1. Department of Management, Entrepreneurship, and Technology, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV, USA

    Kirk D. Silvernail

  2. Department of Management, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

    Maja Graso

  3. Department of Management, California State University, Fullerton, Fullerton, CA, USA

    Rommel O. Salvador

  4. Department of Management, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA, USA

    Jane K. Miller

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Silvernail, K.D., Graso, M., Salvador, R.O. et al. Perceived fairness of faculty governance: a study of 51 countries. High Educ 82, 615–633 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-021-00708-5

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