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Abstract
In the early 2000s, several post-communist countries launched reforms of university management and governance marked by the influence of a ‘modernization agenda’ for higher education governance, which was promoted by the World Bank, the OECD and the European Commission. However, this ‘modernization agenda’ was employed differently in different countries. This article examines the mechanisms involved in such ‘translation’ through a comparison of the introduction of university governing boards in Lithuania and Romania. There were two key findings. First, in line with the literature, it appears that institutional features formed during the institutional design process at the time of the transition in the early 1990s played an important role in translating the ‘modernization agenda’ almost 20 years later. They set in motion path-dependent logics that affected the manner and extent to which a ‘modernization agenda’ was ‘translated’. Second, data gathered through extensive interviewing across the two national cases further show how actors' perceptions of institutions may also crucially influence policy translation.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Ioana Cirstocea, Dorota Dakowska, Robert Harmsen, Marvin Lazerson and Liviu Matei for useful comments on earlier versions of this work. All errors remain my own.
Notes
1. The European Commission uses a similar term, ‘modernization agenda’, in its policy template for universities (e.g. http://ec.europa.eu/euraxess/pdf/COM%282006%29_208.pdf). The European Commission uses this term to refer to a set of tasks to be delivered, whereas Gornitzka and Maassen (Citation2011) use it as a frame of reference. In this article, the term is used in line with Gornitzka and Maassen, serving as a tool for analysis.
2. For the sake of simplicity, I use the generic term Education Ministry to refer to ministries dealing with HE because the names of these ministries changed over time and differed in different countries.
3. At the time, the catedra was a subunit of a faculty organized around disciplines or families of disciplines (Romanian Parliament Citation1995).
4. http://www.constantinescu.ro/en/biografie.htm (accessed 3 June 2014).
5. There were two other drafts of the education law, which were to some extent part of the adopted law.
6. The process of selecting the rector from candidates coming from public competition and proposed by the senate to the body with external stakeholders was similar to the process valid in Austria at the time of preparation of the 2011 Law around the year 2007 (Austrian Parliament Citation2002).
7. The opposition's proposal built to a large extent on Zakatitiene's proposal. It differed in some controversial areas, such as tuition fees.
8. Zakaitiene and her expert team preparing the law had similar view of the boards as the opposition parties.
9. The appointment of members of the board is in line with the US system where, at a number of public universities, the governor appoints members of the board (http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/1793/Board-Trustees-College-University.html, accessed 15 April 2014).
10. E.g. Gintaras Steponavicius from the Liberal Movement Party became the education minister; Nerija Putinaite, former adviser to Lithuanian President and university teacher, became the vice education minister; Remigijus Simasius, former head of the Lithuanian Free Market Institute, became the justice minister; Mantas Adomenas, a member of Homeland Union – Christian Democrats, became an MP.
11. According to the interviews, during preparation of the 2009 Law, there were three studies of boards in different countries carried out by several actors: one by the rector (at the time) of ISM; one by the Lithuanian Research Council; and one by a British Council project.