Higher education quality assessment and university change: A theoretical approach

Abstract

This chapter is devoted to finding theoretical approaches to understand how quality assessment causes transformation of higher education institutions. Firstly, studies on quality assessment in higher education are reviewed. The context in which quality assessment emerged in the higher education system, its purposes and the approaches to operating it are discussed. Based on previous empirical studies, the main impact of quality assessment on evaluated universities is summarised, and the factors determining the impact are tentatively proposed. Then, the focus turns to a theoretical exploration of how quality assessment, as an external force, causes university change. Theories about organisational change, the working processes and structures of higher education systems and the operating mechanism of quality assessment are examined. Building on these theories, a perspective is proposed to help to understand the ways in which quality assessment processes interact with universities to generate change.