The Bulgarian academic profession in transition

In this essay I analyze the current status of the academicprofession in Bulgaria at a time of difficult socio-economictransition. After providing a brief overview of the historicaldevelopment of Bulgarian academia, I discuss faculty workingconditions, the career path within the profession and the legalframework for the professoriate. Numerous problems with respectto finances, institutional infrastructure and legal environmentchallenge the status quo of the Bulgarian faculty. The essaycloses by highlighting the future key issues for theacademic profession that focus around its finanacial viability,difficulties in recruiting a new generation of scholars, the qualityof teaching and learning, and faculty entrepreneurship.     

The US academic profession: Key policy challenges

The US academic profession is currently under considerable pressure due to a complex array of demographic, economic, social, and technological developments. The profession has recently witnessed major shifts in the areas of assessment and accountability, governance and power, faculty roles and functions, and recruitment patterns. This article examines a number of key policy dilemmas and challenges taking place in the profession owing to these developments.     

Academic profession in academic organization

It has been argued that academic organizations are organized anarchies with ambiguous goal functions and uncertain technologies. Academia cannot evaluate itself because its dynamics is the garbage-can process. The counter-argument is that rational academic man(woman) is a substitute for organizational foolishness. The organizational behavior of academic institutions must be interpreted in terms of the logic of the academic profession.     

The robed baron: The academic profession in the Italian university

The Italian academic profession is subject to complex bureaucratic structures and many strains as the result of rapid academic expansion but very limited resources. The ladder up the academic profession is both complicated and very difficult. Norms of professionalism are in conflict with the traditional patron system. This paper analyzes the current situation of the academic profession in Italian universities, and stresses a discussion of the career ladder and how it works in the academic system.Data for this paper have been collected as part of a research grant no. 73.00982.09 from the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche.     

The peripatetic professor: the internationalisation of the academic profession

The internationalisation of the academic profession is a growing, iflittle studied, phenomenon, in contemporary higher education, and thearticle studies attitudes and behavioural outcomes of academic staff from arange of countries in relation to this dimension. After brief allusions topast examples of academic staff mobility, a routine measure ofinternationalisation was used to divide the International Survey populationinto two groups (peripatetic and indigenous). Results indicatedsignificant differences in both values and performance, in a range of areas.Substantial differences are also reported between many systems of highereducation. The article concludes with some comparisons of other staffmobility schemes, and a defense of the worth of international experience foracademic staff.     

Australasian academic developers' conceptions of the profession

Seventy-one professionals working in the field of academic/educational/teaching development were surveyed on issues relating to the profession. From that sample, 22 developers were interviewed on a range of related issues pertaining to their perceptions of the profession. The interviewees referred to the profession using different terminology for quite specific and often historical reasons. Different and sometimes diametrically opposed conceptionsof the profession were held by different individuals. In this paper I report on the divergent conceptions of the profession which were reported in those interviews.     

The academic profession in North Macedonia: A never ending transition

The context of Macedonian higher education has changed dramatically in the last fifteen years. A rapid increase in the number of public and private institutions and a greater diversity of higher education degrees have not been associated with improvements in quality. The research output of academic staff is modest; academics contribute little to the society's development. Academia in North Macedonia is under pressure due to chronic underfinancing of higher education and research, and an underdeveloped system of quality assurance, as well as growing expectations for relevance and internationalisation. This article presents an original empirical study on academic staff. It examines how 388 faculty at higher education institutions in North Macedonia perceived changes in the environment of the academic profession, and how changes in their working conditions potentially influence their academic identity and wellbeing. The results are compared to European data. Findings show that about half of research participants believed that the overall conditions for work and the quality of teaching, learning and research have deteriorated in recent years. This contributes to a perception of the academic profession as stressful and unattractive which results in lower levels of overall academic wellbeing which constitutes a threat to academic identity amongst the staff. Consequently, we expect further decreases in motivation, work ethic and productivity in the academic profession, as well as an increase in the desire of academics to leave Macedonia.     

Changing knowledge and the academic profession in Portugal

The paper analyses the Portuguese academics' perceptions about changes in their research activities and modes of knowledge production. Quantitative data gathered from an on‐line national survey have been used to develop this analysis. Results reveal that the majority of academics declared that they were not involved in knowledge and technology transfer and that their research activities were not influenced by external sponsors or clients. However, they did recognise that were strong external pressures to reconfigure the epistemologies, ontologies and the institutional conditions under which knowledge is produced. The data analysis also reveals that academics recognise forms of hybridism between autonomy and endogenous dynamics and heteronomy and exogenous dynamics in the development of their research activities and knowledge production.     

The academic profession in Spain: Between the civil service and the market

The academic profession in Spain is coming to the end of a dynamic period that is the consequence of profound changes and growth. Tenured academic staff with civil servant status enjoy reasonable working conditions. Nevertheless, recruitment and promotion procedures are now under scrutiny. The situation of nontenured academic staff is rather less positive.     

Challenges in developing the academic profession in the Western Balkans

In this paper, we explore the developmental challenges facing the academic profession in Europe and especially in some Western Balkan countries, Croatia and Slovenia. First, we look at how the higher education environment determines key changes to the academic profession: expectations to demonstrate professional expertise, internationalisation, segmentation, and precarity. While these processes are mainly considered from the above perspective, we also examine the work of academics from within. Second, we discuss aspects of academic tasks, challenges of synchronising academic work with performance measures, intensification of work and expansion of bureaucratic tasks. Building on these perspectives, we introduce a qualitative pilot study that tests how these general trends described in the literature may be applied to given situations in five countries of former Yugoslavia: Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, North Macedonia and Kosovo. Although these countries cover a relatively small geographical area, the differences among them with respect to the economy, society and politics are important. Our findings suggest that problems accumulating in academic work in Slovenia and Croatia were in almost all of the surveyed aspects less problematic than in the three other observed countries.     

Academe in transition: Transformations in the Polish academic profession

The period since 1989 has been an extremely dynamic one in Polish highereducation. New opportunities have opened up for the academic community,along with new challenges. Suddenly, the academic profession has arrivedat a stage that combines far-reaching autonomy with rather uncertainindividual career prospects. In recent years, a number of new laws havebeen proposed that were intended to change the whole structure ofrecruitment, promotions, remuneration, working conditions, andappointments of academic faculty. All this has occurred admidst thestrains and tensions resulting from changes in the broader society. Thesudden passage from the more or less elite higher education system tomass higher education with a strong and dynamic private sector hastransformed the situation of the academic community beyond allrecognition. The transition has resulted in a new set of values andchanges in position, tasks, and roles for academe in society. Today,the future of the Polish academic profession remains undetermined. Thepositive changes were accompanied by the chronic underfunding of publichigher education. Polish academics have learned to accommodatethemselves to the permanent state of uncertainty in which they areforced to operate. The present paper analyzes the current situation fromthe perspective of global changes affecting the academic profession.     

Women in the academic profession: Evolution or stagnation?

This article focuses on women in the academic profession and reports a study of the social origins of Greek university staff and their career pattern. Data show that women have made few gains as university professors over the past twenty years. The gains recorded in Greece are the result of democratization of the university. As women enter the academy, particularly on teaching staffs, they tend to be older and from more middle-class professional backgrounds than are their male peers. The author notes that the entry of women as academics occurs at a time when universities are experiencing a decline in real and symbolic power.     

Pressures and prospects facing the academic profession in the Netherlands

The nature of the academic profession has changed considerably, due to a shift toward a private sector model and changes in the management of teaching and research. Increasingly, universities are able to employ and manage their own staff. Methods are explored that allow for flexibility in appointments and for individual, subject, or market differences.     

The academic profession in Britain: A study in the failure to adapt to change

The article describes the impact of mass higher education and increasing financial stringency on the academic profession in Britain: the profession has fragmented and salary levels have fallen comparatively. The author argues that the profession has failed to adapt to the changes and that its continued adherence to a common salary scale represents a constraint on the system as a whole.     

法国高等教育管理体制变革中的教师学术职业

法国作为中央集权管理体制的典型代表,正经历着高等教育分权的变革。大学自治对教师职业存在的重要影响,在学术责任、聘任与晋升制度、质量评估等方面,表现为教师流动性低、教学与研究结合困难、评估缺乏激励性、学术职业前景黯淡等。增强大学的自主性、改革僵化的管理体制是解决学术职业发展中的矛盾的重要前提。     

分工视角中的学术职业

从分工的视角来看 ,现代大学的学科制度既促进也制约着学术职业的发展。而学术自由作为学术职业的突出特点 ,与学术人格之间形成的良性互动 ,成为学术职业的现实推动力。我国学术职业的发展中面临着种种问题 ,应该从职业分工的角度来研究我国的大学教师 ,以便确立他们的社会地位 ,推进学术研究的发展     

Deviancy from the norms of science: The effects of anomie and alienation in the academic profession

Anomie Theory, as formulated by Robert K. Merton, has been posited as a possible explanatory framework for deviancy from the norms of science.Anomie is the inability of some individuals to achieve excessively emphasized group goals through adherence to group norms. This study tests Anomie Theory by using alienation from the reward system of academic disciplines as an operationalization of this theory. Findings suggest support for Anomie Theory as an explanation for deviancy from the norms of communality, disinterestedness, and universalism. Implications for such topics as the use of norms as interpretative devices and the ambivalence of academics over compliance with dominant and subsidiary (counter-norms) are discussed. Implications for professional practice are also offered.     

The quality of scientific scholarship and the “graying” of the academic profession: A skeptical view

The results of a number of citation studies have been utilized to support the view that the graying of the academic profession will have no impact on the quality of work produced in various scientific disciplines. This conclusion is challenged. It is argued that citations may not indicate the most innovative and creative work, that age may be negatively related to the creation and reception of innovative work, and that the age structure of a scientific community may have an impact on the ability of innovative work to be produced and accepted.