Collegial or Managerial? Academics' Conceptions of Quality in English and Finnish Universities

Abstract

Two specific forms of quality are identified: Type I, which has a managerial focus and stresses fitness for purpose and accountability, and Type II, which is collegial and concerned with enhancement. Through an analysis of the literature on quality in higher education and small-scale empirical research with a sample of academic staff, this article compares conceptions of quality assurance in the English and Finnish higher education systems. The authors highlight the similarities and differences in the two countries and possible reasons for them. Over time the blend of managerial and collegial approaches to quality has come to favour the former but much more so in England than in Finland, which continues to prefer a largely enhancement-led agenda. Both are signatories to the Bologna Declaration, and the implications for other European countries of convergence in quality assurance systems by 2011 through this Declaration are considered.

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