The Changing Governance of Thai Higher Education

Abstract

This chapter situates the case of Thailand in relation to the broader conversation on the global convergence of higher education (HE) governance. While the definition of governance varies and encompasses a host of contested meanings and definitions, this chapter looks at one specific aspect of governance in HE: the rise of quality-related policy or quality policy for short. The term “quality policy” was coined by Ozga et al. (Fabricating quality: Data and governance in Europe. Routledge, Oxford, pp. 1–8, 2011) to connote the current discussion of differing policies: quality assessment/assurance, quality management, and quality audit. This ensemble of quality policies shares similar trends, which include a focus on measuring, quantitative indicators, and ranking between and within education systems. Quality becomes a generic goal in and of itself, travelling across public and private organizations, schools and universities (Ozga et al. in Fabricating quality: Data and governance in Europe. Routledge, Oxford, pp. 1–8, 2011).