The Risky Business of Doctoral Management

Abstract

Universities are under no less pressure to adopt risk management strategies than other public and private organisations. The risk management of doctoral education is a particularly important issue given that a doctorate is the highest academic qualification a university offers and stakes are high in terms of assuring its quality. However, intense risk management can interfere with the intellectual and pedagogical work which are essentially part of doctoral education. This paper seeks to understand how the culture of risk meets the culture of doctoral education and with what effect. The authors draw on sociological understandings of risk in the work of Anthony Giddens (2002) and Ulrich Beck (1992), the anthropological focus on liminality in the work of Mary Douglas (1990), and the psychological theorising of human error in the work of James Reason (1990). The paper concludes that risk consciousness brings its own risks—in particular, the potential transformation of a culture based on intellect into a culture based on compliance.

Notes

1. This draws on findings from an ARC Large Grant Project (2004–06) entitled “The Impact of Risk Management on Higher Degree Research Policy and Pedagogy in Australian Universities”.

2. The private university in the study has at this time a very limited involvement with higher degree research and few risk management strategies in place that relate to higher degree research. Their risk management planning is squarely focused on financial risk. Recent Australian Universities Quality Agency feedback has identified the need for this gap to be filled in that organisation.

3. It is worth noting that the Act that now regulates the conditions of university funding is called The Higher Education Support Act (2003); its predecessor was the Higher Education Funding Act (1988).