Abstract
This chapter introduces selected preferences and perceptions of Hong Kong’s academic profession about university governance. We identify a double-edged feature of university governance in Hong Kong. On the one hand, there is an increasingly top-down pattern of management. This is reflected in the perceptions of academic staff about their low level of involvement in policy making, relative lack of information about institutional workings, and insufficient quality of communication between administration and faculty. On the other hand, academic staff perceptions also point to a significant level of satisfaction and preference for the performance-oriented decision-making that is practiced at universities in Hong Kong. Moreover, their perceptions of the level of academic freedom in Hong Kong’s universities have actually increased over time.
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- 1.
The population data are calculated by merging official data on the population of academics in the eight public-funded universities in Hong Kong (statistics reported by the University Grants Committee at http://www.ugc.edu.hk/eng/ugc/index.htm) and estimated data on those in the three additional institutions which are also included in the sample.
- 2.
As survey design effect has not yet been taken into consideration, we do not claim that the following analyses and discussion speak necessarily to the academic population in each country. Arguments made in the following sections are merely based upon some statistics generated from raw data in the sample. The data will be weighed against some key traits of the population (such as their academic rank, discipline and gender), and some comprehensive statistical analyses will be included in later studies. Thus later in this chapter, the comparison among countries is merely based upon self-selected observations (the response rate is around 11% for the case of Hong Kong) instead of the estimation of the population of each country.
- 3.
Data when class is not in session are not available for the case of Mexico.
- 4.
In the original format, respondents are asked to choose between Scale 1 and 5, with “1” meaning “very much improved” and “5” “very much deteriorated.” For the sake of illustration, the answers have been rescaled so that “−2” means “very much deteriorated”, “2” “very much improved”, and “0” neutral.
- 5.
29% of the total sample scale it as “−1”; around a quarter stay neutral (coded as “0”), and another quarter choose “1.”
- 6.
These items are listed in the questionnaire as follow: classrooms, technology for teaching, laboratories, research equipment and instruments, computer facilities, library facilities and services, your office space, secretarial support, telecommunications (internet, networks and telephones), teaching support staff, research support staff, and research funding.
- 7.
In the survey, respondents in Hong Kong have one additional option of University Senate. In order to make the case of Hong Kong comparable to others, this option is left out of this analysis.
- 8.
We leave the option of students out of our discussion.
- 9.
We are very aware of possible variations within each case, for instance, variations across universities within the same system. Because of the page limit, we will only focus on the level of country/system in this chapter.
- 10.
The comparison is based upon self-selected observations in the two surveys. The outcome may not represent the changing features of the population over time.
- 11.
Simple statistical tests suggest strong correlations between these variables, which will be reported and analyzed in later publications.
- 12.
In order to conduct efficient and thorough across-country comparison, more institutional, historical and contextual factors in each case might need to be incorporated into the analysis.
- 13.
Data for the case of Germany are missing.
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Acknowledgment
We acknowledge the support from the General Research Fund of the Hong Kong Research Grants Council.
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Postiglione, G., Shiru, W. (2011). Hong Kong: Governance and the Double-Edged Academy. In: Locke, W., Cummings, W., Fisher, D. (eds) Changing Governance and Management in Higher Education. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective, vol 2. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1140-2_16
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