Higher Education Policy, 2007, 20, (261274) r 2007 International Association of Universities 0952-8733/07 $30.00 www.palgrave-journals.

com/hep

Institutional Autonomy Revisited: Autonomy Justified and Accounted

Ingrid Moses
Chancellery, University of Canberra, Canberra ACT 2601, Australia. E-mail: ingrid.moses@canberra.edu.au

Australian universities have enjoyed large-scale autonomy. In a society that increasingly regards university education from an instrumentalist point of view, universities anxious safeguarding of their autonomy is widely seen as an attempt to evade accountability. Yet there has been an acceptance that a corollary to autonomy is accountability. Over the past 20 years, the boundaries of autonomy have changed and accountability requirements multiplied. This paper explores the developments in Australia within a wider international context. In particular, it notes changes in seven areas of institutional autonomy, staff, students, curriculum and teaching, academic standards, research and publications, governance, and administration and finance. It concludes that Australian universities have been responsive to societal expectations within the boundaries of changing institutional autonomy. Higher Education Policy (2007) 20, 261274. doi:10.1057/palgrave.hep.8300157 Keywords: autonomy; accountability; academic freedom; Australian higher education

Introduction
Universities throughout the world and over the centuries have operated within varying degrees of institutional autonomy and have granted varying degrees of academic freedom to their academic staff. And academic staff, too, have researched and taught with varying degrees of personal autonomy and under conditions ranging from complete academic freedom to complete absence of academic freedom. Students academic freedom has similarly varied: they, too, in some places have learnt what they were told to learn and how, and elsewhere had complete freedom in what they enrolled in and how they structured their learning. Why is autonomy important? Modern consensus, at least in the developed world, is that universities mission, in general, is not only the transmission, creation and transfer of knowledge and education for lifelong learning, productive employment and engaged citizenship. Universities also have the role as a social conscience of society in their pursuit of truth and in their

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articulation of universal values. One might argue that all of this can be achieved in a tightly regulated university system, as long as academic freedom is granted, as has been demonstrated in the past in many West and North European countries. Yet institutional autonomy, individual autonomy and academic freedom are interrelated, although here I will focus only on institutional autonomy.

Dimensions of Autonomy
Anderson and Johnson in their study of university autonomy in 20 countries define autonomy for the purpose of their study as the freedom of an institution to run its own affairs without direction or influence from any level of government (Anderson and Johnson, 1998, 8). They examine the following seven areas where government may be legally allowed to interfere and actually interferes: (1) staff and employment conditions, that is, appointments, promotions and status of academic and senior general staff; (2) students, that is, admissions, progress and discipline; (3) curriculum and teaching, that is, teaching methods, assessment and examinations, course content, and choice of text books; (4) academic standards, that is, degree standards, quality audits and accreditation; (5) research and publication, that is, postgraduate supervision and teaching, priorities for research funding and freedom to publish; (6) governance, that is, governing boards like councils, boards of trustees or governors, academic boards or senates, and student associations and (7) administration and finance, that is, funding of institutions in a diversity of ways through operating grants, capital and equipment grants, one-off projects, non-governmental funding and accountability arrangements (Anderson and Johnson, 1998, 1). The authors group the 20 countries into an Anglo-American group, a European group and an Asian group. Governments in the first group were reported to have less legal authority to influence, interfere or intervene, and indeed exercised this authority less than in the other two groups of countries, with the European universities in the middle. Australia belongs to the AngloAmerican group, even though by 1997/1998, the time of the survey, the government was seen to exert its influence more than many felt it should. Other studies had concurred that Australian university leaders believed that the government had significantly increased its interference in academia over the past few years (Richardson and Fielden, 1997, 9 in Anderson and Johnson, 1998, 3). Anderson and Johnson conclude by saying Australia has experienced a longer period of reform than most countries, involving as it has fundamental changes to student charges, amalgamations of institutions, quality audits and
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profile negotiations between institutions and government. In such a context the findings from this survey should not be unexpected (Anderson and Johnson, 1998, x). The findings were that in the two areas of Students and Governance, in Australia, the government had more authority to intervene than in the average of the 20 countries, and in these two areas and a third, Research and Publications, it also exerted more influence than the average. In Australia, the government overall, however, had less authority to intervene than in 15 of the other countries, all of them non-Anglo-Celtic European or Asian countries. But it exerted more influence, or regulated, legislated, interfered more: Australia is in the middle group of countries, at 11th rank (Anderson and Johnson, 1998, 22).

Changes in Australian Higher Education

So where do we come from? Australian universities are firmly embedded in a British tradition, tempered by the German concept of a Humboldtian university with a teachingresearch nexus and academic freedom, and the American tradition of land grant universities with a commitment to wider access and community service. It is a proud heritage. And within this Australian university tradition, academics have valued, though taken for granted, and defended attacks against collegiality and those conditions of employment and values that were commonly seen as the hallmark of universities: academic freedom, tenure of employment, university autonomy, the pursuit of basic research, the linking of teaching and research, and the right to decide who is taught, how they are taught, and what they are taught (Coaldrake and Stedman, 1998, 27). In this unquestioning valuing and taking for granted of their working conditions and arrangements, academics clearly are out-of-step with the broader community, including government. Over the years, all of these hallmarks have come under attack. University leaders have accepted for the past 20 years and more that the government in an era of mass higher education and therefore spiralling outlays for (or investment in) higher education had a right to demand that universities like other public sector institutions had to be efficient and effective. It was accepted as a corollary to increased funding and, indeed, to large-scale autonomy. The pursuit of efficiency and effectiveness from the early 1980s on, however, gave rise to a change in internal university relationships. As universities were held accountable for efficient and effective operations, so they increased personal accountabilities and curtailed the areas of personal autonomy. As part of the efficiency and effectiveness drive, university leaders and administrators became managers, reducing the collegial relationship to one of supervisor and supervisee. Performance indicators for both institutions and
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individuals were introduced, and over a lengthy period individual performance reviews that sit so uneasily in a collegial environment populated by autonomous scholars slowly gained a foothold. In contrast, institutional performance evaluation was accepted as long as the criteria were transparent and negotiated, and they mostly were. Over twenty plus years, governments have used various pressures, financial incentives and most recently financial penalties and also legislation, to achieve their vision of efficient and effective higher education institutions. University leaders have also accepted that they need to be accountable for what is commonly called taxpayers money and the quality of teaching and graduates, of research and its outcomes, of consultancies and community engagement and, more reluctantly, of the ways all of this is being achieved in particular organizational settings. In those two decades the language has changed: higher education has become an industry; universities have become higher education providers; academic staff have become employees; students have become customers or clients. Productivity, outputs, key performance indicators, performance management, benchmarking, balanced scorecards, market and competition, stakeholders, IOS standards and various other quality tools are all concepts in higher education introduced in the past two to three decades. Societies have changed. Economies have changed. As part of globalization, qualifications and skills, knowledge and technology, innovation and innovative people have become increasingly important to governments. And universities with their central role in producing educated people and knowledge are asked to play a role which government wants to define. And government wants to see universities operating in a market, be student demand driven, entrepreneurial, open to labour market demands and other stakeholders, flexible in its personnel structure and less dependent on government funding. This is also discernible in many parts of Europe. And as Felt noted: At the core of the debate we find the notions of autonomy and academic freedom, and new forms of responsibility towards society and accountability towards stakeholders (Felt, 2003, 3). Over the last 810 years there has been a convergence many European countries are granting more institutional autonomy, Anglo-American ones interfere more (Trow, 2005). The Bologna process involving 45 European countries has contributed to a general convergence. It is interesting to note several references to autonomy and reform in the Trends IV: European Universities Implementing Bologna report, for example Governments must be sensitive to the fact that the goals will not be achieved simply by changing legislation. Institutions need more functional autonomy as a fundamental condition for successful reform and accept that this implies strengthening governance structures, institutional leadership and internal management (Reichert and Tauch, 2005, 5). A clear relationship between the degree of
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functional autonomy and quality processes was noted: y the institutions with the most systematic approach to quality are also those that benefit from the greatest institutional autonomy (Reichert and Tauch, 2005, 31).

Australias Higher Education Reforms and Accountability Framework

In the Ministerial Discussion Paper of April 2002 Higher Education at the Crossroads, which opened the national discussion on higher education and led to a reform package passed in Parliament in December 2003, purposes of higher education and principles for a higher education system were spelt out. It noted: The main purposes of Australian higher education are to: inspire and enable individuals to develop their capabilities to the highest potential; enable individuals to learn throughout their lives (for personal growth and fulfilment, for effective participation in the workforce and for constructive contributions to society); advance knowledge and understanding; aid the applications of knowledge and understanding to the benefit of the economy and society; enable individuals to adapt and learn, consistent with the needs of an adaptable knowledge-based economy and local, regional and national level; and contribute to a democratic, civilised society and promote the tolerance and debate that underpins it (Commonwealth DEST, April 2002, 12). This would be delivered if Australia had, and it was said it needed, a system of institutions that were: value adding; learner-centred; high quality; equitable; responsive; diverse; innovative; flexible; cost-effective; publicly accountable and socially responsible (Commonwealth DEST, April 2002, 23). There was a large-scale agreement with this within the Australian higher education system, and much of it can be delivered with some confidence. However, there are two main contributing factors: adequate financing and appropriate degrees of autonomy. No one within the Australian higher education system would call government funding adequate. However, the government is trying to ensure that its agenda is fulfilled by special purpose funding for which institutions compete, thereby steering without interfering in autonomy. As far as degrees of autonomy are concerned, the first two purposes of higher education cited above do not depend on institutional autonomy, and the third: advance knowledge and understanding only partly. Universities role in knowledge production, dissemination and transfer does not require institutional autonomy. We have seen scientific discoveries and innovation in totalitarian states where universities and also academic staff had minimal autonomy. In the social sciences and humanities disciplines in particular, however, teaching and research scholars will require at least academic freedom if not autonomy.1 I would contest that in order for universities and their academics to contribute to a democratic, civilized society and promote the
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tolerance and debate that underpins it, government interference in the inner workings of academia has to be minimal. And even when governments do not actually interfere, they can create a climate of fear in financially dependent institutions that stifles open debate and comment. Most of the reforms in the higher education system have followed extensive consultation processes through discussion papers, submissions, focus and stakeholder groups. The vice-chancellors as a group have acquiesced, some welcoming the governments change agenda, others not wanting to jeopardize much needed extra funding, although most of this went to research. The intrusiveness, the micromanagement enshrined in legislation from 2003 on and in funding programme guidelines, was unprecedented in recent times, prompting a former education bureaucrat to comment that had not two vice-chancellors intervened or challenged some clauses in the legislation and provided an alternative, universities would have lost considerable autonomy and would have been treated like schools (Gallagher, 2006, 7). Vice-chancellors, and staff and student unions tried in vain to gain the support of stakeholder groups for both more funding and less interference. The financial necessity, then, forced the universities to work with the government on achieving the governments aims. Ironically, this happened at a time when government funding of universities on a per student basis had declined, when the governments share of universities operating grants had come to an alltime low; when Australian students were contributing more and more and significant proportions of the universities income was derived from international students fees. The situation in Australian higher education is aptly described by Neaves concept of conditional autonomy, acknowledging that as the Minister has claimed, institutions still have large-scale autonomy: Autonomy can be exercised only on condition that the individual institute or department fulfils national or establishment norms which are continually to be renegotiated in the light of public policy (Neave, 1988, 46). Over the past decade, indeed since the Commonwealth (federal) government took over funding of higher education in the mid-1970s, efficiency and effectiveness and accountability have been the values that defined the governments demands of universities. Universities have not shirked accountability. They are audited by their states auditor-general, report annually to state parliament, undergo professional accreditation and collect and report to the federal government data on all aspects of the university operation. The following is a description from the Departments website (www.dest. gov.au) concerning the Institution Assessment Framework (IAF): Universities are accountable to the Commonwealth Government through the Institution Assessment Framework (IAF). The IAF, which replaced Educational Profiles in 2004, is founded on the responsibilities of the
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Commonwealth to ensure that the institutions it funds are sustainable and deliver the outputs for which they are funded, that their outcomes are of a high quality and that they comply with their legal obligations. The IAF produces an across-the-board assessment of institutional achievements based on quantitative and qualitative data from universities and external sources. The Commonwealth assessment of an institution forms the basis of strategic bilateral discussions between the Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST) and an individual institution. The data for the assessment are in large part drawn from information that is publicly available, or already produced by universities, or already collected routinely from universities. The Framework has four principal elements: 1. Organisational sustainability strategic focus, risk management, financial viability; 2. Achievements in higher education provision teaching/learning, research and research training, equity and indigenous access; 3. Quality outcomes systems and processes, teaching/learning, research, AUQA audit; 4. Compliance financial acquittal, national governance protocols, workplace reform, programme guidelines and legislation. Universities receive a report with comparative data and evaluative remarks. While the government is exhorting universities to differentiate themselves in the market the IAF report for each university displays its achievements against those of the whole sector and a group of comparator universities, thereby creating tension with the drive for diversity between institutions. Have the boundaries of our autonomy changed within this framework? We will examine this under the seven headings used in the Anderson and Johnson study. But first it is useful to hear the governments opinion of universities as this is an indication of the shifting boundaries and the conditionality of autonomy. In an environment where politicians frequently criticize universities and their leaders, it was refreshing to see an acknowledgement in the Ministers opening remarks of a paper prepared for the government review: Over the past decade the environment in which universities operate, and the academic enterprise itself, have changed dramatically. Vice-chancellors, supported by their administrative and academic leadership structures, have succeeded in guiding their universities through a period of considerable change and uncertainty. Corporate and financial challenges have generally been well managed. Quality standards remain high (Commonwealth DEST, August 2002, 1). The Minister changed his tone when introducing in May 2003 the package of reforms called Our Universities: Backing Australias future: y Globalisation,
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massification of higher education, a revolution in communications and the need for lifelong learning, leave Australian universities nowhere to hide from the winds of change. y. And, y Increased funding without changes to administration, regulation and perverse incentives for institutional and individual behaviour will only compound the significant challenges facing the sector y (Budget statement). The result: dramatic intervention by the government in crucial areas: governance, workplace relations, financing and research, to name but a few. Staff These perverse incentives were addressed in significant workplace relations legislation. Universities have had full autonomy in staffing matters, whether it be the appointment of the vice-chancellors, professors, or casual staff and determined progression and promotion. Salary levels, however, and a large number of conditions of employment, including tenure, had been regulated and the minima were negotiated nationwide with the National Tertiary Education Union. During a previous Labour government, salary increases were required to be productivity related and were only partially funded by the Commonwealth. The present conservative government tried to break the power of the unions and succeeded by virtue of its parliamentary majority in linking the much-needed increases to a universitys operating grant to compliance with a host of extremely intrusive workplace relations matters. No university could afford to forego these additional funds (2.5% in Year 1, 5% in Year 2, 7.5% in Year 3), and none did. This micromanagement of workplace relations far exceeded the workplace relations reforms in the wider economy. Having tried exhortations and financial incentives, the government in the end had to introduce workplace relations legislation in order to achieve its aims. The government regards these requirements as one of the principal policy instruments designed to reform workplaces in the higher education sector (Commonwealth DEST, 2006, 80). This curtailment of university autonomy was accompanied by stringent annual reporting requirements. Students Universities decide on admission criteria for students, although the number of students in particular fields of studies is negotiated with the government for funding purposes. Government monitors enrolment and success of various equity groups women in particular fields of study, students from a nonEnglish speaking background, students from low socioeconomic background, regional and isolated students, students with a disability and indigenous
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students. While not setting quotas it provides incentive funding, including scholarships and financial rewards. Universities have been recently required to publish student evaluations of subjects on their websites, and a once voluntary participation in the national Course Experience Questionnaire and Graduate Destination Survey has become mandatory and part of the IAF data considered by the government in its assessment of a universitys Achievements in higher education provision and Quality outcomes. The introduction of before and after testing of generic skills of university students has been on a voluntary basis with little take-up by the universities. Progress and attrition of students has to be reported and is monitored, but there has been no interference by the government. However, where international students are involved, both mode of study and progress are regulated with impact on students visa eligibility. Universities conduct their own disciplinary procedures but are required now by law to have grievance procedures. Overall, there has been an assumption by government of a role of student advocate with concomitant increased reporting by universities. Curriculum and teaching Universities also have autonomy with regard to their academic programmes they are self-accrediting institutions, and the state does not control or examine the curriculum: content, teaching methods or assessment. Academic freedom had not been touched on, but recently the government proposed that readings in terrorism studies were illegal under the new terrorism laws leading to an outcry in the academic community. While universities decide which degree courses to offer within the broad fields of study in which they have negotiated with the government to enrol students, the government has been putting pressure on universities to be more diverse. There are regularly comments about too many law courses, too many MBAs, too many business courses; that universities have to find their niches, have to build on and market their strengths and be demand driven. Though universities are self-accrediting and have autonomy with regard to the curriculum, Minister Nelson attacked universities that offered cappucino courses, courses not of university standard in his opinion, while at the same time he regaled universities that did not respond to student demand. But the government has found itself in a dilemma universities having had to become leaner and more efficient have cut nonviable courses, and the scarcity or unavailability of various disciplines of sudden national importance has led to both the requirement to notify the government of course closures in particular fields of studies and to funding for areas of national importance, for example, Islamic studies and Arabic. There is
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also incentive funding for collaboration between universities in teaching and course delivery. Academic standards Universities are self-accrediting institutions neither the federal nor the state government imposes external exams to moderate standards between institutions or ensure minimum standards, though Ph.D. dissertations commonly have external examiners. Universities monitor quality and standards through a system of peer review. There is an Australian Qualifications Framework that sets broad guidelines for various awards. Internally, most universities have regular cycles of subject and course evaluations, of reviews of schools and faculties, of centres and of support units, usually involving peers from other institutions. While there is no state accreditation, professional associations regularly review and accredit degree programmes leading to professional degrees, for example, engineering, architecture, accounting, medicine, nursing, teaching, etc. Since 2000, universities have been audited every 5 years by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA), a company owned by the federal, state and territory governments. AUQA was established to promote and ensure quality in higher education provisions and, in particular, to assure our international partners of the quality of Australian higher education. AUQA also audits the state accreditation agencies that accredit private colleges. AUQA completed its first cycle of reviews in 2007. In its second cycle it will focus on outcomes, standards and benchmarking. This stronger focus on outcomes is in response to the governments frequently voiced concern about maintaining the reputation of Australian higher education, about differentiation, and in particular about increasing the number of top-ranked universities. Universities on the whole have participated graciously in the exercise, acknowledging the benefit of self-review and external validation of what they are doing despite the huge time and staff investment in the exercise. Research and publication Government has declared its vested interest in research and postgraduate teaching. The funding formulae for research and research training are heavily influenced by performance indicators leading to the desired consequences of differentiated research income. Government in consultation with the university sector and other stakeholders has introduced a broad national agenda with national research priorities. While research funding is highly competitive and prioritized, those staff who do not need funding have been free to research whatever they wished to research. It is only recently that governments have
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refused funding of particular grants they thought trivial usually grants in the humanities, often to do with gender or sex studies, and lately in terrorism studies. These interferences in the freedom to research have led to hot debates in the media. In the pursuit of more individual accountability, universities have decreased the individual autonomy and staff have to account for their time if they pursue research that does not produce tangible outcomes even in the medium term, they are likely to be given a higher teaching load. Indeed, the accountability drive within higher education has led to very much changed expectations about how and how much academic staff need to work and show results for their work. The impending Research Quality Framework, modelled on the UK Research Assessment Exercise, will be highly interventionist, in no way related to lack of accountability and begs the question whether it will lead to more efficiency or effectiveness or to more and better research and research utilization. University staff are free to publish. But for inclusion in the governments research funding formula only publications in well-defined categories count. The need to produce the data for the government has put yet another heavy reporting duty on universities. It also has diverted much needed engagement with the professions and the wider society through relevant publications to publications only in journals that count. Linking of teaching and research is still the ideal in Australian universities, though the funding for teaching and research is separate and the government is contemplating allowing teachingonly universities. The government clearly has steered via funding mechanisms to achieve its goals, and it has been effective in changing the research culture in universities. From letting a thousand flowers bloom in internal research funding, universities have moved to concentrated funding in centres that could claim or aspire to national or international reputation, have rewarded excellent researchers and insisted on quality outcomes. Governance Australian universities are established by Act of Parliament of their State or Territory (apart from the ANU, which was established by the Commonwealth), but state funding is negligible with the Commonwealth or federal government providing funding for student places in particular fields of study and much of the competitive funding for research. Universities are accountable to both levels of government. Despite the collapse of large private companies, the Australian government believed that university governing boards should be streamlined to reflect company boards and legislated that universities had to meet 11 National Governance Protocols that prescribe the minimum functions,
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maximum size and types of allowable members on university governing boards in order to qualify for the before-mentioned additions to the operating grant. Just as universities had complied with the workplace relations requirements, all universities were able to meet this condition, even though all university acts had to be changed by the state parliaments to comply an act of financial blackmail by the Australian government that worked. While many within the higher education sector had no objection to the protocols themselves, the government significantly interfered in the autonomy of the universities. With a new federal minister in office, more changes to governance are foreshadowed; the present maximum size will be reduced (if the federal Minister gets the states to agree) and elected academic and general staff as well as students may be the casualties, thereby finishing the transformation of universities from self-governing public institutions to public sector organizations with an external board. Indeed, the community of scholars, the collegial decision making, which was once the hallmark of universities will have virtually gone, replaced by an accountable and responsible line management and only advisory collegial bodies within universities. Collegiality is now a description of personal interaction, no longer of university decision making and governance. It is interesting to note here that the new Higher Education Freedom Law of the German state of North Rhine Westphalia, which strengthens the universities autonomy vis-a`-vis the government in quite a number of areas, also changes governance arrangements but still gives great power to the academic senate the collegium. Student associations under new legislation can no longer be funded by student contributions raised by the universities. The so-called Voluntary Student Union legislation has taken the financial basis from political student associations, a thorn in the governments side. But students are still represented in all areas of university governance. Whether elected students will remain on the smaller governing boards of the future remains to be seen. Administration and finance Within an international context, Australian universities have considerable autonomy in administration and finance. They can normally invest, divest and borrow in respect of property and commercial ventures as their governing bodies see fit (Commonwealth DEST, April 2002, 5). The assets normally belong to them, and they can operate commercial enterprises to support university goals. For a couple of decades now the government has exhorted, pressured and partially prescribed how universities can be better managed and administered. Universities receive one-line budgets but have to deliver what has been negotiated, and the IAF is meant to ensure this. All funds, whether the annual
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operating grant, programme grants or one-off grants, have detailed reporting requirements. This is onerous but accepted as a condition of funding. Funding parameters have changed and universities have gained some freedom in setting fees for students, albeit within a tight framework. Indeed, Australian universities are used to government steerage via funding and have been completely complicit in the increasing reporting requirements, if only to access much needed funds. It is only recently that the government had to resort to legislation to get universities to comply with its change agenda not because universities refused to become more efficient and effective, responsible and accountable, but because universities and governments disagreed on which conditions are necessary to support the mission of universities. Within the Australian context then, this does mean that autonomy has been eroded while universities have become ever more accountable, ever more efficient, and arguably, even more effective.

Conclusions
Within the boundaries of the changing autonomy universities have been responsive to societal expectations. They have been value adding considering the broad access to higher education; they have been trying to be learnercentred for some 2030 years; they are of uneven but generally high quality; they are all committed to equity; they are responsive to stakeholders; they are diverse and trying to be more so; they promote innovation and innovative people; and they are flexible within the constraints of legislation and agreements, cost-effective, publicly accountable and socially responsible. Wide-ranging institutional autonomy, though curtailed in some areas, has provided a framework in which developments could take place. Despite higher education being the third largest exporter of services in Australia, and despite its success as a comparatively small country in international rankings, no one is complacent. In the end, the government and the universities will only achieve their respective goals if the individual academics find their work environment conducive to their scholarly work despite the curtailment of individual and institutional autonomy and a burdensome increase in individual accountability. Note
1 While there are disagreements about ethical boundaries particularly in the biological sciences, in Australia, the only projects for funding that were recommended through the peer review process to the Minister and refused funding were in the Humanities and Social Sciences.
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References
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