Getting to shared governance: New perspectives for implementing governance

Abstract

Effective shared governance processes enhance institutional effectiveness and sustainability, but governance in higher education is complex. The concept of shared governance lacks common understandings and practice, and models are outdated and need to be more inclusive, nimble, and flexible. Community colleges are responsive institutions and therefore well‐positioned to have a role in rethinking shared governance. However, before we can create new models, we need new ways of thinking about governance. Based on trends in research on shared governance in this chapter, we argue that new perspectives on shared governance include a focus on trust and transparency and provide examples of shared governance opportunities and challenges through the perspectives of key stakeholders. We suggest interest‐based bargaining as one of the tools for institutions to manage important conversations about stakeholders’ shared responsibility for student success. We may never agree on shared governance, but we need to find a way of effective, participatory governance. This chapter creates some opportunities for creating such a space.

Academic capture in the Anthropocene: a framework to assess climate action in higher education

“…Capture is about disproportionate power, and many universities have a culture of advantaging and promoting some people and some ideas while explicitly disadvantaging, excluding and disregarding other people and their ideas. Much has been written about the power dynamics between faculty and administrators in higher education (Kater and Burke 2022;Ginsberg 2011;O'Meara 2011). Bess and Dee (2014) describe the rising conflicts between faculty and administrators due to competition for resources, extensive oversight through performance monitoring systems, and differences in prioritization of multiple competing goals that results in "negative repercussions" whereby "faculty and staff fear retribution if they speak too forcefully in opposition to an administrative initiative."…”

“…Additionally, Honeycutt et al (2023) report a significant portion of faculty support punishing their colleagues in ways that can chill expression to create a "spiral of silence" termed "soft authoritarianism and reinforced through formal and informal channels." As a remedy to the dynamics between and within faculty and administrative groups, Kater and Burke (2022) advocate for increased transparency and more participatory forms of university governance.…”