Publisher's Synopsis
This book does not see policy and policy-making as distinct from or 'above' processes of implementation and change. It acknowledges that policy is made in ways other than in formal settings of government or vice-chancellors' offices. Policy is also 'made' as it is received, interpreted and implemented in different locales, and it is made too as academics go about their daily business (whether they are aware of this or not). Therefore, this volume focuses on three levels of analysis: national policy-making; institutional strategy; and the ground level of departments and individual academics. Examples from various countries (featuring, for instance, deregulation and new managerialism) are analyzed in the light of recent theoretical understandings of the policy process; and they address the key question of how and why the intentions of policy-makers often result in unintended consequences.
Higher Education Policy and Institutional Change captures the complexities, compromises, contradictions, and localized character of policy-making for and change within universities and colleges.
