Academic staff hold multiple identities by relating to the organization and to their profession. Merging higher education institutions involves organizational changes which may impact identities of academic staff. This paper studies potential impacts on staff perceptions of their organizational and academic identities through a 2-year in-depth…

Recruitment is one of the main strategic tools for universities, which aim to hire the best possible candidates for their academic positions. However, not every institution can hire whom they perceive as the best. Our paper investigates what are perceived to be the most pressing hindrances to attracting the best researchers. We focus on national…

This paper uses register data to study how a particular age reward feature affects admission into two highly competitive study programs: medicine and law. The Norwegian admission system to higher education is centralized, and applicants compete in two quotas: one quota almost entirely based on grade point average from upper secondary education and…

Many studies on research productivity and performance suggest that men consistently outperform women. However, women and men are spread unevenly throughout the academy both horizontally (e.g., by scientific field) and vertically (e.g., by academic position), suggesting that aggregate numbers (comparing all men with all women) may reflect the…

This article deals with internationalization in the field of higher education, focusing on the impact of transnational academic mobility on the university communities. Drawing on the results of a qualitative research study at different departments in a Norwegian university, this article explores the interaction between transnational academics and…

In recent decades, many higher education systems around the world have been exposed to institutional mergers. While the rationale for mergers has often been related to issues of improved quality, effectiveness and/or efficiency at the institutional level, fewer studies have analysed how mergers may affect institutional diversity within the higher…

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether international student mobility (ISM) has an impact on the transition from higher education to work. Two measures of labour market outcomes are investigated: unemployment and skills mismatch. To go beyond existing research, we analyse whether the effect of ISM on these outcomes vary by fields of…

Studies on academic recruitment processes have demonstrated that universities evaluate candidates for research positions using multiple criteria. However, most studies on preferences regarding evaluative criteria in recruitment processes focus on a single country, while cross-country studies are rare. Additionally, though studies have documented…

This article explores the impact of cultural resources on success and aspirations among second-generation immigrants in higher education in Norway. We investigate whether and how cultural resources are converted into advantages in higher education. The data consist of cross-sectional survey data and in-depth interviews with Norwegian students of…

The study presented here identifies robust and time-invariant features that characterise dynamic and innovative research environments. It takes as its point of departure the results of an empirical study conducted in 2002 which identified the common characteristics of 15 dynamic and innovative public research environments, and focusses on their…

It has been argued that universities are changing into becoming more professional as organizations, and this paper investigates this claim by exploring the emergence and tasks of communication departments in modern universities. Examination of universities in six Baltic and Nordic countries shows that communication departments are working closely…

Because of governance and management changes in universities in recent decades, the working environment of university academics has changed. The objectives of this cross-sectional study were to investigate whether university academics are more workaholic and report more work-family conflicts than other university personnel and to provide empirical…

Increasing reliance on market mechanisms in higher education is analysed both as one of the approaches to steering as well as in relation to the consequences of markets for quality and accessibility of higher education. This article goes beyond the normative considerations of market elements as inherently good or bad and the economic theory-guided…

This article explores the changing character and consequences of state authorities' evolving relationships with universities in the United States, Germany, and Norway--typical cases for different national worlds of higher education. It argues that across the three OECD countries, welfare states have strengthened market principles in university…

This article questions what kind of actors become involved and analyzes what forms of knowledge are activated, when discourses such as "research-based" and "profession-oriented" become basic preconditions in national curriculum change processes in Norway. A "mapping" is conducted, comprised of actors and ideas, played…