This paper considers tensions between corporate models of governance focused on the governing body and more traditional, consensual academic approaches. It argues that despite these tensions, a decline in the role of the academic community in matters of institutional governance (shared governance) is neither desirable nor inevitable, and that successful academic participation is possible through a combination of the corporate and consensual modes. Tracing a decline in academic participation from its height in the 1970s, the paper evaluates the problematic nature of more recent corporate approaches to university governance and the work of Dearlove (1997), (2002) and Deem is used to reflect on tensions between the logic of managerial control and the conventions of professional autonomy (Deem, 1998, p. 52). The paper ends by offering a broad and flexible model for successful shared governance, drawing on the role of academic departments and Clarks strengthened steering core (1998).