THEORISING INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE THROUGH A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN SOUTH AFRICA AND A CASE STUDY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE FREE STATE by Joseph Bazirake Besigye MA PCS, MUK, 2014 BA (SS), MUK, 2008 Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the School of Higher Education Studies Faculty of Education Supervisor: Dr C. Suransky Co-supervisor: Dr WP Wahl UNIVERSITY OF THE FREE STATE JUNE 2020 i Declaration I, Joseph Bazirake Besigye, declare that the thesis: Theorizing Institutional Change Through a Historical Analysis of Higher Education in South Africa and a Case Study of the University Of The Free State, submitted for the qualification of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of the Free State is my own independent work. All the sources that I have used have been indicated and acknowledged by means of complete references. I further declare that I have not previously submitted this work at another university or faculty to obtain a qualification. 30-06-2020 …………………………………………. ………………… SIGNED DATE ii Ethics Statement iii Language editing iv Abstract This study sought to understand higher education change by drawing from the theoretical premises of institutional change. The study relied on an exploration of the bounded context of South African Higher Education. Therein, the case example of the University of the Free State was used to demonstrate the intricacies of higher education institutional processes that significantly cut across various contextual bounds. The design of the study was located within the pragmatic paradigm and drew from its corresponding abductive form of reasoning. This chosen design explored a blend between a historical and case study approach. It also relied on documentary sources for historical analyses. It emerged from the study that higher education institutional change ought to be cognizant of the often conflated institutional/organisational overlap in higher education studies. This recognition was in line with the advancement of a layered institutional change proposition in which the analyses of this study considered three institutional layers. Firstly, the evolutionary perspective was applied to the analysis of the changing socio-political premise of the South African polity and represented the meta-institutional layer of this study. Secondly, the design perspective was applied to the study of the changing policy framework of South African higher education and represented the macro institutional layer. Lastly, the equilibrium perspective was applied to the analysis of the changing institutional processes at the University of the Free State. The University’s context represented the micro-institutional layer of this study. This study analysed the historical institutional change trajectories that linked the evolving socio-political context of the South African polity to the design of South Africa’s higher education policies and to the varying equilibrium positions at the University of the Free State. The study determined that studies in Higher education and change ought to consider a layered institutional approach in which the transitions within higher education establishments are analysed across a network of institutional relationships. Also, the study recommends that historical trajectories are more significant in the analyses of change when considered as departure points, rather than as path-dependent determinants of institutional change processes. v Keywords Design view; Equilibrium perspectives; Evolutionary view; Higher Education studies; Historical analysis; Institutional change; Organisational change; South African Higher Education; Theories of change; University of the Free State. vi Dedication This work is dedicated to my beloved newlywed wife, Crystal Rutangye-Bazirake. The physical separation during the first year of our marriage (which happened to be the final year of writing this thesis) has been a significant strain on both of us. I thank you for the support and understanding, despite our inability to be together due to the Covid-19 travel restrictions. We have endured shared loneliness, and yet apart, we continue to nurture this bond of a lifetime. I dedicate the rest of our lives to working for our successful marriage. Mukwano, ebilungi bili mumaaso, nga Mukama ye mubeezi waffe! vii Acknowledgements Before enrolling for my PhD studies, countless numbers of people warned me about how daunting and lonely the process would be. However, none of their well-intentioned forewarnings prepared me for the mixed journey that this thesis has borne to come to its completion. I want first to acknowledge how far this journey has come; one that did not only start when I first enrolled for PhD studies at the University of the Free State in 2014. My parents, Dr and Mrs Bazirake Bernard & Joyce, have been very instrumental in setting up this journey. My father, as a PhD holder himself, symbolises academic resilience for me, given all the hurdles that he had to overcome to become whom he is. My mom, on the other hand, was my first teacher (yes, she taught in the same primary school that I attended!) and she often had to stand her ground to keep me in check. From my parents, I have acquired valuable life lessons of endurance and balance, which have also been instrumental in the completion of this thesis. I acknowledge and thank Prof. Melanie Walker for granting me the benefit of the doubt to enrol on her doctoral fellowship program in Higher Education and development in 2014. She introduced me to this fascinating field of Higher Education studies and the capabilities approach. I want to particularly thank her for prioritising my wellbeing and allowing me to find an alternative fit early on in my doctoral process. Also, I want to thank Mr JC van der Merwe and Prof. Andre Keet. They provided me with the opportunity to find my right fit at the Institute for Reconciliation and Social Justice (now, the Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice). The support of the Institute/Unit has been invaluable in the conception and the completion of this work. Also, I thank Prof. Willy Nel (RIP), who believed in me without a doubt and egged me on in both academic and professional exploits. In our last conversation, only a week before your eternal rest, you assured me that my PhD was pretty much complete. Prof. Willy, you are momentously missed at the time of the completion of this thesis; how I wish that you were here to see that I finally believe you! I wrote these words down on the day of your funeral (20.04. 2019): “Prof. Nel, may your death provide the impetus for me to see our dream through, as a way of honouring your life. Amen” RIP Prof. W. Nel I also want to acknowledge the encouragement, dedication, motivation and thoughtfulness of Dr Carolina Suransky. Dr Suransky agreed to become my study leader, even long before we viii were clear on what my study would entail. Your unconditional faith in me and the way that you stood by me when I was at different brinks of discouragement has been such a gift. You helped me to remain focused on the goal of this thesis with your unwavering belief in its potential contribution. I would never have wished for a more understanding and thorough study leader than yourself! I hope that I can mentor other generations of scholars with the same patience and care that you have extended towards me. That is my pledge to you, Dr Suransky. I would also like to acknowledge Dr WP Wahl, who generously came on board as my second supervisor after Prof. Nel’s passing. You have been a fabulous guide who kept your door open for me at any time. You also ensured that I remained abreast with the required University and other technical guidelines. Carolina, Willy (RIP) and Wahl, we made such a fantastic team, and I appreciate you very much. I want to also thank colleagues, present and former at the Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice, particularly Mrs Rochelle Ferreira, the ever empathetic and supportive office manager. Giselle, Matau, Xolille, Anne, Emmanuel, Moruti, Sahar, Rachel, Andiswa, Mike, Maroyi, Tarminder, Luis, Dionne, Collins, Chandi, Martin, Taabo, Jackie and Mili thank you all for the encouragement and support. I also thank my friends from the Rotary club of Bloemfontein-Raadzaal. This Rotary family has enabled me to be part of such a wonderful community of support in Bloemfontein. The UFS volleyball teammates also significantly contributed to my physical fitness and good health throughout this PhD journey. I again thank my Sunday fellowship group for the spiritual guidance, particularly the leadership of Ps. Brian Sweetlove and Ps. John van Tonder. Furthermore, to my Bloemfontein family of Arnold and Phlynne, thank you for watching out for me on every step of the way. You have been friends, confidants and family and provided the sweetest home away from home for me. To you all, I will combine two lingoes from my native Uganda and say: Mwebale Nnyo, mwebalile ddala (Thank you very much) Haza Ruhanga abongyere emigisha (and may God bless you even more). I owe ultimate gratitude for this PhD journey to God. I thank God for this opportunity of a lifetime, where I have also had the good fortune of meeting several amazing people during my residency in South Africa. Many of these people have become very dear friends. I am sincerely grateful for the overall pleasantness of my stay in South Africa. I am thankful for the intellectual, social and spiritual nourishment that I have been received, by the grace of God. ix Table of contents DECLARATION ..................................................................................................................................................... I ETHICS STATEMENT ............................................................................................................................................ II LANGUAGE EDITING ............................................................................................................................................ III ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................................................... IV KEYWORDS ........................................................................................................................................................ V DEDICATION ...................................................................................................................................................... VI ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................................................... VII LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................................................... XIII LIST OF ACRONYMS .............................................................................................................................. XIV CHAPTER I ................................................................................................................................................... 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION: THEORISING HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE ................ 1 1.1 THE GENERAL CONTEXT OF INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN HIGHER EDUCATION .................................. 1 1.2 THE AFRICAN CONTEXT OF HIGHER EDUCATION AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE ...................................... 4 1.3 THE SYSTEMIC CONTEXT OF HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE AND SOUTH AFRICA ...................................... 7 1.4 THE UFS CASE WITHIN BROADER HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE THEORISATION PREMISES ................... 11 1.5 PURPOSE OF THEORISING HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE .......................................................................... 13 1.6 RESEARCH FOCUS ...................................................................................................................................... 14 1.7 RESEARCH PROBLEM ................................................................................................................................. 15 1.8 RESEARCH AIM .......................................................................................................................................... 18 1.8.1 Research Question .............................................................................................................................. 18 1.8.2 Subsidiary questions ........................................................................................................................... 18 1.8.3 Research Objectives ............................................................................................................................ 19 1.9 DISCIPLINARY LOCATION AND THE VALUE OF THE STUDY ....................................................................... 19 1.10 CHAPTER SUMMARY ................................................................................................................................ 20 CHAPTER II ................................................................................................................................................ 21 2.0 ORGANISATIONAL AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE .... 21 2.1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 21 2.2 DEFINING INSTITUTIONAL AND ORGANISATIONAL ARRANGEMENTS ....................................................... 21 2.2.1. Institutions as social-rule systems ...................................................................................................... 22 2.2.2. Institutions as regimes in equilibria ................................................................................................... 23 2.2.3 Institutional attributes: formal and informal institutional arrangements ........................................... 25 2.2.4 Institutional agency and structure ...................................................................................................... 27 2.2.5 Understanding institutional formation and stability in institutional arrangements. ........................... 29 i) Institutional formation ........................................................................................................................................... 29 ii) Institutional stability ............................................................................................................................................. 31 2.2.6 Locating change within institutional arrangements ............................................................................ 32 2.3 THEORISING INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE ...................................................................................................... 33 2.3.1 General premises for theorising institutional change ......................................................................... 33 2.3.2 Schools of institutional change ........................................................................................................... 37 2.3.3 Key approaches to institutional change theorisation .......................................................................... 38 i) Sociological institutionalism and Game theory ..................................................................................................... 39 ii) Rational-choice institutionalism and the Equilibrium view of institutions ........................................................... 39 iii) Historical institutionalism and path dependence theory ...................................................................................... 40 2.3.4 Institutional change and the organisational context ........................................................................... 41 2.3.5 Organisational change in shared institutional fields .......................................................................... 44 i) Exogenous pressure for organisational change ...................................................................................................... 45 x ii) Endogenous constraints of organisational change ................................................................................................ 46 2.3.6 Institutional theory in organisational change ..................................................................................... 46 2.4 INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE THEORISATION IN THE HE CONTEXT ............................................................... 47 2.5 ORGANISATIONAL THEORIES OF CHANGE IN THE CONTEXT OF HIGHER EDUCATION ............................ 50 2.5.1 Evolutionary theories of change ......................................................................................................... 52 2.5.2 Teleological theories of change .......................................................................................................... 52 2.5.3 Life cycle theories of change ............................................................................................................... 53 2.5.4 Dialectical theories of change ............................................................................................................ 53 2.5.5 Social cognition theories of change .................................................................................................... 54 2.5.6 Cultural theories of change ................................................................................................................. 54 2.6 SYNTHESISING THE ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE THEORIES IN HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE .................. 54 2.7 INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN THE HIGHER EDUCATION CONTEXT OF SOUTH AFRICA .............................. 56 2.8 CHAPTER SUMMARY .................................................................................................................................. 58 CHAPTER III .............................................................................................................................................. 59 3.0 RESEARCH DESIGN & METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................ 59 3.1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 59 3.2 RESEARCH APPROACH ............................................................................................................................... 59 3.3 THE CASE FOR ABDUCTIVE REASONING .................................................................................................... 60 3.3.1 Merits of abductive reasoning for this study ....................................................................................... 63 3.3.2 Engaging with the limitations of abductive reasoning ........................................................................ 64 3.4. RESEARCH PARADIGM ................................................................................................................................ 65 3.4.1 Towards a pragmatic research paradigm ........................................................................................... 65 3.4.2 Appraising the pragmatic paradigm for this study ............................................................................. 66 3.5 RESEARCH DESIGN ...................................................................................................................................... 68 3.5.1 Ontology.............................................................................................................................................. 68 3.5.2 Epistemology ....................................................................................................................................... 69 3.6 THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE ........................................................................................................................ 71 3.6.1 Synthesising theoretical approaches ................................................................................................... 71 3.6.2 Towards an integral theoretical perspective ....................................................................................... 72 3.7 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY......................................................................................................................... 74 3.7.1 Historical analysis .............................................................................................................................. 74 3.7.2 Case study: SA HE and the UFS ......................................................................................................... 76 3.7.3 Towards a blended research design .................................................................................................... 78 3.8 METHODS & SOURCES OF DATA .................................................................................................................. 79 3.8.1 Criteria for Data selection and collection and analysis ..................................................................... 79 3.8.2 Documentary sources .......................................................................................................................... 80 3.9 ROLE OF THE RESEARCHER .......................................................................................................................... 83 3.10 RESEARCH ETHICS .................................................................................................................................... 84 3.11 CHAPTER SUMMARY ................................................................................................................................. 84 CHAPTER IV ............................................................................................................................................... 86 4.0 HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF SA HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE (1873–2010) ............................ 86 4.1 INTRODUCTION AND CHAPTER ORGANISATION ....................................................................................... 86 4.2 A HISTORICAL ANALYTICAL APPROACH TO THEORISING SA HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE ................... 87 4.3 THE INITIATION OF FORMAL EDUCATIONAL PROCESSES IN COLONIAL SOUTH AFRICA ......................... 88 4.3.1 Coupling between basic education and the church ............................................................................. 91 4.3.2. Basic education as a private affair .................................................................................................... 92 4.3.3 Contestations for early Basic education in South Africa .................................................................... 93 4.3.4 Power brokerage and the early schooling system in South Africa ...................................................... 96 4.3.5 Initial expansion of Education processes outside the Cape ................................................................ 98 4.3.6 Emerging issues within the initial basic education and implication for SA HE .................................. 99 xi 4.4 THE RISE OF POST-PRIMARY EDUCATION (1829–1900) .......................................................................... 100 4.4.1 The extension of post-primary arrangements into SA HE (1973–1900) ........................................... 102 4.4.2 Early contestations in SA HE (1873–1900) ...................................................................................... 104 4.5 SHAPING SA HE IN THE CHANGING COLONIAL CONTEXT 1900–1945 ................................................... 106 4.5.1 Consolidating the synonymy of the University and Higher Education ............................................. 108 4.5.2 The Rise of University Autonomy in SA HE ...................................................................................... 111 4.6 SA HE AND APARTHEID LEGISLATION (1950–1990) .............................................................................. 112 4.6.1 The institutionalisation of segregation in SA HE during apartheid .................................................. 113 4.6.2 The consolidation of State control over SA HE during apartheid ..................................................... 116 4.6.3 Statutory divisions within SA HE ...................................................................................................... 118 4.6.4 Dualism as an evolving institutional feature for SA HE ................................................................... 121 4.6.5 Resistance and opposition to the SA HE status quo during apartheid .............................................. 124 4.7 SA HE AND REFORM PROCESS 1990–2010 .............................................................................................. 126 4.7.1 Transitionary period for SA HE reform (1990–1994)....................................................................... 127 4.7.2 The SA HE legislative shift and reforms in the post-apartheid period (1994-2010) ......................... 129 4.8 CHAPTER SUMMARY AND EMERGING TRAJECTORIES OF INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN SA HE ............. 131 CHAPTER V .............................................................................................................................................. 133 5.0 A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE AT UFS ......................................... 133 5.1 INTRODUCTION AND CHAPTER OVERVIEW ............................................................................................. 133 5.2 DELIMITING INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE FRAMING IN THE CONTEXT OF THE UFS .................................. 134 5.3 DOCUMENTARY SOURCES FOR ANALYSING THE UFS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE FRAMEWORK ............. 135 5.4 AN ANNOTATED PRE-1990 HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSITY IN THE FREE STATE..................................... 137 5.4.1 Grey College and the nationalism question (1855–1904) ................................................................. 137 5.4.2 Grey University College and the pre-apartheid context (1904–1950) .............................................. 141 i) Language and nationalism woes at the Grey University college ......................................................................... 142 ii) Political activism and the Grey University college ............................................................................................. 144 iii) Racial exclusion and the Grey University college ............................................................................................. 145 iv) From Grey University college to the University College of the Free State ........................................................ 146 v) Cultural uptake at the university college of the Free State ................................................................................. 148 vi) Summary of GUC and the UCOFS.................................................................................................................... 149 5.4.3 The Autonomous University of the Orange Free State and apartheid (1950–1990) ......................... 149 5.4.4 Summary on the 1873–1990 history of the UOFS. ............................................................................ 153 5.5 THE EMERGENCE OF THE UFS FROM APARTHEID (1990–2010) ............................................................ 154 5.5.1 Confronting institutionalised identities at the UFS ........................................................................... 157 5.5.2 Participatory forums and community committees in planning for institutional change ................... 161 5.5.3 Transformation as the mantra for post-apartheid institutional change ............................................ 165 5.5.4 Role of Rectors in the 1990–2010 period .......................................................................................... 169 i) Francois Retief and the multiculturalism approach to diversity (1989–1997) ..................................................... 170 ii) Stef Coetzee and the revitalisation strategy (1996–2002) ................................................................................... 173 iii) Frederick Fourie and the Turnaround strategy (2003–2008) ............................................................................. 176 iv) Jonathan Jansen: The human and academic projects (2009 & 2010) ................................................................. 181 5.6 IMPLICATIONS OF FOCUS ON DIVERSITY AND MULTICULTURALISM ON UFS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IMPERATIVES ................................................................................................................................................. 183 5.7 LOCATING UFS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IMPERATIVES IN 1990–2010 PERIOD ................................... 186 5.8 CHAPTER CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................... 188 CHAPTER VI ............................................................................................................................................. 190 6.0 DISCUSSION, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FURTHER STUDIES ......... 190 6.1 INTRODUCTION AND CHAPTER OVERVIEW ............................................................................................. 190 6.2 THEORIZATION AND THE BASIS OF KNOWLEDGE CLAIMS OF THIS STUDY ............................................. 190 6.3 THE ORIGINALITY OF THE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE INFERENCES IN THIS STUDY ................................ 191 6.4 THE SALIENT CONSTITUENTS OF HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE THEORIES (RQ1) ................................. 193 xii 6.4.1 The organizational/institutional intersection as a salient constituent of HE institutional change theorization ................................................................................................................................................ 194 6.4.2 Advancing institutional layering as a salient constituent of HE institutional change ...................... 196 i) The evolutionary perspective of institutional change in HE ............................................................................... 197 ii) The design perspective of institutional change in HE ........................................................................................ 200 iii) The equilibrium perspective of institutional change in HE ................................................................................ 202 6.4.3 Summary of salient constituents of HE institutional change theorisation......................................... 205 6.5 TRAJECTORIES THAT DROVE SA HE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE 1873 TO 2010 (RQ2) ........................... 205 6.5.1 SA HE Trajectories in the pre-1900 period of colonial formation .................................................... 206 i) SA HE Trajectory (1) .......................................................................................................................................... 207 ii) SA HE Trajectory (2) .......................................................................................................................................... 208 6.5.2 SA HE trajectories in the 1900–1950 and the leap towards autonomy............................................. 208 iii) SA HE Trajectory (3) ......................................................................................................................................... 209 iv) SA HE Trajectory (4) ......................................................................................................................................... 210 6.5.3 SA HE trajectories in the 1950–1990 apartheid period .................................................................... 211 v) SA HE trajectory (5)............................................................................................................................................ 213 6.5.4 The SA HE trajectories in the 1990–2010 drive towards non-racial democracy.............................. 213 6.6 INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE AT THE UFS FROM 1990–2010 (RQ3) ............................................................ 217 6.6.1 The unstable equilibrium position of the UFS 1990–2010 ................................................................ 217 6.6.2 The identity-based oscillations of the equilibrium position at the UFS (1990–2010) ....................... 219 6.6.3 Transformation as an institutional change imperative at the UFS ................................................... 220 6.6.4 Transitioning from identity-based to value-based institutional equilibrium at UFS ........................ 221 6.6.5 Summary of the emergence of the UFS in its apartheid history ........................................................ 222 6. 7 CONCLUSIONS ......................................................................................................................................... 223 6.7.1 Conclusion (I): Higher Education institutional Change as a layered process ................................. 223 6.7.2 Conclusion (II): Higher Education establishments as agents and structures ................................... 224 6.7.2 Conclusion (III): Historical trajectories as paths of departure ........................................................ 224 6.8 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY ................................................................................................................... 225 6.9 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH ..................................................................................... 227 BIBLIOGRAPHY ...................................................................................................................................... 229 xiii List of figures Figure 1: How abduction compares to deduction and induction in research ........................................ 62 Figure 2: The research design process (Patel, 2005)............................................................................. 68 Figure 3: Integral theoretical perspective .............................................................................................. 73 Figure 4: Transformation and institutional change imperatives for post-apartheid UFS .................... 167 Figure 5: Layered institutional change perspective ............................................................................ 197 Figure 6: Historical location of stability/instability of UFS equilibrium ............................................ 204 Figure 7: A summary of the historical trajectories of SA HE ............................................................. 216 xiv List of acronyms ANC : African national congress ANSB : Afrikaanse Nationale Studentebond ASB : Afrikaanse Studentebond BTF : Broad Transformation Forum CHE : Council on Higher Education CNE : Christian National Education CNO : Christelik Nationaal Onderwys DEIC : Dutch East India Company DET : Department of Education and Training DRC : Dutch Reformed Church GC : Grey College GUC : Grey University College HE : Higher Education HEQC : Higher Education Quality Committee HES : Higher Education Studies NCHE : National Commission on Higher Education NECC : National Education Crisis Committee NEED : Need for Education Elevation and Development NEPI : National Policy Investigation NP : National Party NPHE : National Plan for Higher Education NUSAS : National Union of South African Students OECD : Economic Co-operation and Development OFS : Orange Free State xv RDP : Reconstruction and Development Programme RQ : Research Question SA HE : South African Higher Education SABC : South African Broadcasting Corporation SANSCO : South African National Student Congress SAPs : Structural Adjustment Policies SASCO : South African Student Congress SASO : South African Students' Organisation TC : Transformation Committee TF : Transformation Forum TPTT : Transformation Plan Task Team UCGH : University of the Cape of Good Hope UCOFS : University College of the Free State UCT : University of Cape Town UFS : University of the Free State UNISA : University of South Africa UOFS : University of the Orange Free State U(O)FS : University of the (Orange) Free State UoTs : Universities of Technology UWC : University of the Western Cape WITS : University of Witwatersrand 1 CHAPTER I 1.0 INTRODUCTION: THEORISING HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE 1.1 The general context of institutional change in higher education The institutional change context of higher education (HE) is agreeably complex. This is because the HE field encompasses within it several processes that seek to balance change and adaptation to local, regional and national interests; and all this, amidst global pressures (Altbach, Reisberg & Rumblsey, 2009; Vaira, 2004; Carnoy & Rhoten, 2002). The complexity of the higher education field also relates directly to the diversity of the stakeholders and the multiple interests that they represent. Therefore, HE is not only a complicated field to analyse, but one whose change parameters are also difficult to anticipate or predict. Vaira (2004) presents this complexity within his perspective on institutional change in HE, which he notes, is often embroidered in a framework of historical, structural and cultural circumstances that form the basis for its institutionalisation processes. These qualities ensure that HE institutional change manifests as an interplay of processes which cut across several internal and external institutional constraints, thus requiring comprehensive approaches in its study. Nonetheless, higher education has always stood out as a vital repository and defender of culture and as an agent in cultural change (Johnstone, Arora & Experton, 1998). In the same way, the field of higher education also acts as a critical driver for national aspirations of economic growth and the pursuit of collective goals. As such, Johnstone et al. (1998) argue that the appeal of higher education remains closely linked to the public interest, regardless of whether institutions are publicly or privately owned, or are publicly or privately financed. 2 It is vital to note, therefore, that the global higher education system and its practices are in constant transition, due to the multitude of interests that arise from within its varied contexts. This multiplicity of interests has, in turn, resulted into ongoing challenges of leadership, owing to the way that higher education institutions expect to adapt to changes in their context and as they alter their purpose simultaneously (Drew, 2010; Kezar, Carducci & Contreras-McGavin, 2006). Such anticipated adaptations are often confronted by a discrepancy between the changing societal realities amidst higher education institutional continuities, as Gornitzka, Kogan & Amaral (2005) indicate. At the same time, higher education institutions are often caught between the web of demands to respond to their changing social contexts, and yet they continue to draw their stability from the safety net provided by their age-long traditions, as Shapiro (2005) argues. In his extensive and highly instructive study of higher education and change, Ansell (2008) focused on its variants across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. His study demonstrated how higher education systems fall within general categories that are not only difficult to transition from but are also highly politicised. Ansell’s study generally categorised higher education systems across three broad possibilities: 1) partially private systems, 2) mass public systems, and 3) elite systems. Arguably, the transitions across these three systems are often driven by highly politicised mechanisms that Ansell refers to as a ‘trilemma’ of concerns, which have implications on the trajectories for higher education change. This trilemma of concerns relates to how various higher education systems measure along with the three extreme positions of mass enrolment, full public subsidization and total public spending. Whereas Ansell focused on how to differentiate higher education systems based on the variances in their enrolment and public funding modalities within OECD countries, his study opens up to a critical enquiry that this study ventured to undertake. The question of how the lens of institutional change theories — where the institutional structures 3 and their rule systems influence an establishment’s change parameters — can be used to understand changes in the overlapping contexts within the higher education system was thus, considered for this study. The enquiry in this study sought to understand the change modalities of HE systems, mainly, in institutional terms and as an interplay between internal and external systemic elements. This study conceived the potential benefit that the insights into HE change processes could benefit from the deliberations located within institutional change theorisation. The study acknowledged the premise of institutional change in higher education systems as an interconnected process that operates within various networks. The study’s starting point was a consideration that higher education change processes demonstrate considerable variations, owing to the way that the socio-political circumstances of a given polity mediate the networks within each context. This study is set apart from most studies in higher education that often cover a limited conceptual scope, and as illustrated by Teichler’s (2000), tend to operate primarily on a problem-driven basis. It is this problem-driven approach that Fumasoli and Stensaker (2013) critique in their argument that despite the number of multi-disciplinary studies conducted within higher education, they barely engage with its conceptual evolution as a field. Nevertheless, as Fumasoli and Stensaker further note, HE research has distinguished itself as an applied field. It seeks to address the needs of policymakers who coordinate the national system level, as well as academic leaders, managers and administrators who work towards the efficiency and effectiveness of higher education establishments. This study advances an approach that engages with the HE institutional dimension of change that cuts across the practitioners and the contexts within which they operate. 4 1.2 The African context of higher education and institutional change Across the African continent, it is significant to note that the existing HE setups sprouted from institutionalised educational processes that emerged from colonial-era extensions of primary and secondary schooling levels. It is from this historical context that the setting of the contemporary African University manifests within dynamics and tendencies that are not easy to analyse (Zeleza, 2009). With the growing calls for the liberation of Africa’s education structures from the dominion of ‘Eurocentric’ knowledge systems as noted by Higgs (2012), the pursuit for higher education contextual relevance in Africa remains at odds with the desire to align itself with global trends. These realities have furthered demands for more functional alterations to HE systems across the African continent, with far-reaching implications on the mechanics of enrolment, access and the control of HE establishments (Varghese 2013; Teferra & Altbachl 2004). Sherman (1990) took note of the changing trends of African higher education by attributing them to an increase in demand owing to the upsurge of qualifying students, who originate from the already robust and highly expanded primary and secondary school levels across the continent. This increase in demand to partake of higher education has, for instance, been a significant stimulus for expanded university access that has gradually resulted in changes in the size and nature of the demographics that higher education serves. This recognition of Africa’s higher education institutional complexities is not new. At the 1972 Accra HE conference, there was a call on African universities to not only commit to the provision of knowledge for its own sake but also to support the pursuit of knowledge aimed at the improvement of African conditions (Yesufu, 1973). Similarly, Wandira’s (1977) historic proposals for the reform of African higher education advanced the need to adopt a form of flexibility in the way that HE institutional spaces operate across the African continent. In his view, this was to allow for the contextual variations across the continent to find expression 5 within a diversity of possible HE formations aligned with their appropriate form and purpose within the varied contexts. Such was Wandira’s call for a ‘truly African university’ (1977: 22); a university expected to arise and draw inspiration from the African environment itself. More recently, the 2015 Declaration and Action Plan for African HE set out with a mission to develop a high quality, massive, vibrant, diverse, differentiated, innovative, autonomous, and socially responsible higher education sector in Africa. This declaration aimed at positioning the HE sector at the centre of the production of the necessary human capital for the continent’s goals such as inclusive and sustainable development; democratic citizenship; and repositioning the continent as a major global actor. It is, therefore, no wonder that when Sawyer (2004) located African HE within its context, he did so on the premise that each state would take the responsibility to play a crucial oversight role, especially if the quality standards of HE are to remain uncompromised. Sawyer admonishes the expanded access to HE across the African continent, whose impetus has been in line with the adoption of global massification trends that have led to persistent overcrowding and an increasingly questionable HE quality standard. At the same time, Cloete and Maassen (2015) note that the HE setup in Africa still struggles with an inherent level of elitism, which has resulted into an incongruence with the immediate local context, despite ongoing attempts towards expanded access. The elitism that defies HE’s allegiance to its local context, and the massification that compromises its standards are only examples to suggest the potentially contradictory indicators for HE change expectations in Africa, to which the socio-political context play a significant driving force. The expansion of the private sector in Africa has contributed to the recontextualisation of its HE framework and aided broader access to its diverse populace and groups that would have been otherwise excluded (Cloete & Maassen, 2015). However, the privatisation of African universities was criticised by Mamdani (2008), who, while considering the case of Makerere 6 University in Uganda, noted the failure to distinguish privatisation from commercialisation. He argued that the interests of the public were not prioritised in the neoliberal turn of the African university arrangement, in favour of the market forces. Similarly, Zeleza (2016) traces a shift in African HE that emerged from the 1990s through the World Bank’s imposed structural adjustment policies (SAPs). The SAPs resulted in the reduction of support to social sectors, including higher education in this push for economic liberalisation that in turn led to the rise of for-profit private HE institutions in Africa. Despite the expansion of the private sector in African HE provision alongside the growing cost-sharing inclination of the traditionally public HE establishments, state mechanisms remain critical in the direction of HE and its enabling policies. As such, several new players within the HE scene continue to emerge, while continuities and changes within its structures solidify the place of HE within the plethora of continually changing expectations across the continent. This overview provided from within the African context, therefore, strengthens this study’s choice for considering HE institutional change as a network of systemic processes that cut across multiple socio-political contexts, players and the nature of rules within which they operate. The institutional framing of this study also takes note of the role of historical institutional processes that affect ongoing systemic processes of change in HE. In Africa, this is even more discernible by the way that the continent’s colonial histories have had implications on the structuring of its HE system. As this study set out to understand change processes through an institutional change theoretical lens, the placement within the African context gave rise to a specific focus on the South African example that was analysed historically as part of the HE institutional change theoretical premise of the study. Part of the rationale for this choice emerges from the country’s long and stark history of colonial, apartheid, and liberation contexts in which its socio-political circumstances have often laid out varying HE institutional processes across different historical periods. 7 1.3 The systemic context of HE institutional change in South Africa The South African context provides a melting pot for illustrating the systemic linkages of higher education institutional change as has been historically experienced in varying degrees across the rest of the continent. The country’s lengthy and well documented colonial history that was followed by a blend of multiple settler patterns and the tragic experimentation with the apartheid system of racially and ethnically inspired separateness provides for this contextual appropriateness. By the time South Africa ushered in democratic governance in 1994, it had experienced over half a century of systematic racial segregation under the apartheid political dispensation. Centuries before that, it had experienced an entangled overlap of colonial, postcolonial, migration and settlement patterns that formed a coalescence of historical experiences that are arguably representative of most of the rest of the African continent - albeit in varying contextual forms. The fact that the South African setting offers a one-stop location for one to look at the transcendence of various historically relevant socio-political premises made it a worthy context for this study. This study is in line with Wolpe’s (1995) description of the South African Higher Education (SA HE) system as being held in the historical context of a dual but integrated system. SA HE is motivated, as he notes, by a relatively advanced political economy, which is, at the same time, located within a social order of a historical colonial setup and perverse backwardness. This context provided a broad spectrum within which this study explored the intersection in the historical interplay between various social and political forces in the institutionalisation process of the HE. In contemporary times, South Africa has exhibited a significant commitment towards the transformation of its higher education framework as part of the bid to institutionalise a new social and economic post-apartheid order (Badat, 2010). Quite crucially, Higher education transformation in South Africa receives significant attention in the country’s socio-political 8 remodelling, and this offers a critical edge in studying how its change imperatives can be institutionally understood. In the post-apartheid period, priority has been placed on the expansion of democratic practices into all public spheres through a state-steering mechanism, and the extension of the democratic ethos in South African Higher Education seeks to create a balance between institutional autonomy and public accountability (Hall, Symens & Luescher, 2002; Hall & Symes, 2005). It follows that the state in South Africa has recognisably played a pivotal role in the framing of SA HE, as argued by Cloete and Muller (1998) and Olivier (2001). It is from this point of departure that institutional framing in higher education change premises takes the mechanisms of the state into account for this study by theorising institutional change through a historical analysis of the dynamic South African higher education historical context. This study comes at a time of expectation for unprecedented changes within South Africa’s HE institutional setup; thus, there has been a relentless focus on attempts towards the transformation of institutional profiles in order to fit within the ethos of the new democratic post-apartheid South Africa. The massive studies conducted by the Council on Higher Education (CHE, 2004; 2007; 2016) describe how SA HE gradually responds to the challenges of social equity, economic and social development as well as the contribution of higher education in building and consolidating democracy in South Africa. These CHE reports undoubtedly offer a helpful reflection on South Africa’s post-apartheid HE state of affairs. However, there remains a glaring gap around how the problematics of change in SA HE frameworks can be understood and engaged with, especially in as far as it relates to the institutionalisation processes that emerge from the state. Such are the kinds of dynamics that Jansen (2004) highlights in his view that the changing landscape of SA HE institutions had been held amidst a continuity in the organisational and staff profiles within the first post-apartheid decade. Jansen’s assertions can be explored further 9 within the understanding of SA HE’s embeddedness in the changes and continuities in South Africa’s historical and social-political contexts, as undertaken in this study. Jansen notes that there have been numerous changes that need to be taken into account when dealing with South Africa’s HE institutional frame. These include: 1) size and shape; 2) meaning of accountability; 3) nature of higher education providers; 4) character of student distribution and characteristics; 5) the organisation of university management and governance; 6) the roles of student politics and organisation; 7) the models of delivery in higher education; 8) the value of higher education programs; 9) the nature of the academic workspaces. These are helpful parameters for reflecting on the change in SA HE as they encompass the depth of institutional considerations within HE that also directly link to the policy directions and state structures. This impasse begs the question as to how the SA HE institutional landscape can be reconsidered and understood within the disparity of change and continuity in the interconnected institutional framework of the state and the policy frame of SA HE. Within the South African example, therefore, it is noted that the post-1990 emphasis on reforms in the mechanics of SA HE was fuelled by the high expectations in the constructive role that education plays in advancing justice and equitability in societies of such perverse historical inequalities, just as the South African example demonstrates with its colonial and apartheid histories (Fiske & Ladd 2004; Walker & Unterhalter, 2007; Le Grange, 2011). Based on these histories, Le Grange (2011) attributes the kinds of challenges that HE in South Africa continues to face as owing to a broader crisis of humanism; where the racial disparities in which SA HE was also absorbed within the machinations of the apartheid state as a means to legitimatize segregation. As a result, she notes that racism remains one of the structural issues that higher education systems in South Africa still have to engage with, where historical aspects of discrimination still wield themselves in various higher education praxis. The critical question that ought to be asked, given the historical state of affairs in SA HE, relates to how the 10 anticipation for change within the institutional context of HE as an embedded entity within the changing socio-political context of South Africa unfolds. It, therefore, remains critical to understand how the mechanics of change in the HE context relate to the historical configurations of colonialism, migration, language and racial bigotry that culminated into various historical trajectories in South Africa. To understand how this historical social-political context refects upon SA HE arguably gives rise to a deeper understanding of institutional approaches to studying change in higher education as advanced by this study. This study’s undertaking is underlined by the consideration that HE can and often does, manifest as a multi-faceted entity that engages with a multiplicity of individual, organisational and institutional stakeholders. These stakeholders participate within the HE frame as part of the dynamic contextual reach that shifts from local, regional, national and global relationships through which system of higher education experience symbiotic relationships across various contexts. South Africa offers an important site for the exploration of change in higher education as an institutional enterprise, considering that its historical frame is a combination of varied socio-political experiences that are unmatched by any other context in recent times. The multiplicity of South Africa’s historical socio-political experiences arguably offer an emblematic setting that can be essential in providing a locus for studying various social- political aspects. This study makes use of these unique historical features of South Africa to explore how institutional change applies as a theoretical premise for understanding change in higher education. The historical analysis in this study therefore broadly considers the linkages across the South African socio-political context and the SA HE body of laws since 1874, when the first phase of HE institutionalisation took root with the establishment of the University of the Cape of Good Hope. This study’s historical analysis stretches from 1874 to 2010 to provide for the inference of institutional change theorisation over an extended period. While this study 11 acknowledges the importance of the freshly evolving aspects of change as exhibited by the ‘must fall’ movements and other dynamic student protests in the decade between 2010 and 2020, the approach of the study emphasises a historically situated analytical premise for institutional change. It does, in effect, provide a foundational premise for the further analysis of the more contemporary aspects of institutional change in SA HE. As such, the applied historical timeline supports the aim of this study that sought to explore how institutional change theories can help us to understand the historical SA HE change processes between 1874 and 2010. Considering the broad premise of the SA HE context, however, the study further focused on the University of the Free State (UFS) as a single case example. This focus contributed to the exploration of a more nuanced approach to understanding the conceptual underpinnings of HE institutional change, within the complexity of the connections that it entails. The methodology chapter of this study expounds the justification for the focus on SA HE and the UFS. It explains how this study benefitted from a pragmatic approach in order to draw reasonable inferences from the context of an individual case. As such, the SA HE institutional framework and the UFS case offered an appropriate local context of analysis for this study in the advancement of institutional change theories into studying change in the HE field. 1.4 The UFS case within broader HE institutional change theorisation premises The institutional layout of SA HE and the specific case of the UFS offers a compelling premise for engaging in a historical analysis of the change process in HE that straddles over various internal and external institutional dynamics. This choice for a single case of the UFS within the SA HE context addresses a fundamental gap that was identified by Badat (2009) in his engagement with the theoretical tenets of institutional change in post-1994 SA HE. While taking note of the paradoxical scene of HE transformation in the new democratic South Africa, Badat contends that institutional change in SA HE emerged out of the simultaneous pursuit by 12 government and progressive social forces for values and goals that, however, are often in conflict with each other (Badat, 2009: 462). This position, he argues, resulted in contradictions that required considerable trade-offs, where some values, goals and strategies have historically taken precedence over others. Badat also draws from Cloete et al. (2002) to claim that most changes within SA HE entities in the post-1990 period did not only emerge from centrally driven government policies. He argues that the post-1990 changes were also as a result of an elaborate interface across policies, societal and market forces, as well as unexpected institutional responses. Badat further argues that there is evidence of more forces than the state and government as identifiable external actors in SA HE. This argument has been instructive in the choice of this study to not only engage with the socio-political dynamics and the policy frameworks in HE institutional change but also with their interface within a localised case example of the UFS. This study also acknowledges that other external forces are at play in HE institutional change processes, as increasingly exhibited by the globalisation and internationalisation of the HE sphere. However, this study delimits state-led processes as the meta-level for institutional change in order to maintain a manageable scope of analysis. The basis for this position is the understanding that state structures mediate between local and international forces of change and that any significant institutional changes in sectors like HE are filtered by what would be admissible within the socio-political underpinnings of the state. This study considers that the intersecting histories of socio-political variables tied to race, ethnicity, language, religion, colonialism and apartheid are identifiable with the trajectories of institutional change as they emerged from within the historical context of SA HE and the UFS. With the help of the emergent historical analysis of institutional change in the SA HE and the UFS illustrations, therefore, this study explored the conceptual dimensions of HE institutional change that circumnavigate various internal and external dynamics within state bounds. 13 Considering that HE institutional change in this study was framed within its alignment with the changing socio-political context in South Africa, a case example of the UFS provided a general overview of the praxis within an individual university establishment. The insights from the UFS provided for the basis of a comprehensive historical analysis that supported a more focused examination of its institutional change processes between 1990 and 2010 period. The attention on institutional change within the UFS in the 1990–2010 period offered the opportunity to conduct, by using historical and archival documentary sources, a more in-depth historical analysis of how the UFS emerged from its apartheid history. In this way, this study contributed to new perspectives in the understanding of institutional change in the HE field through the lens of institutional change theories within the selected context of SA HE and the UFS. 1.5 Purpose of theorising HE institutional change This study responds to the notable deficiency in scholarship on higher education as a subject of inquiry which, for instance, Maton (2004) critiques for its paradox as a field that keeps enormous repositories of literature on other fields but remains inadequately examined in and of itself. As such, this study draws from the theoretical premises of institutional change in order to trace the intricacies within the HE field through the SA HE illustration and the UFS case example. The study extends the use of institutional change theories to studies on HE in a bid to expand on scholarship that seeks, through an institutional change lens, to understand the complexities of change that the field of HE has come to epitomize. Unlike most other studies of change, the merit of the approach of this study is its engagement with the importance of history in studying change (Sydow, Schreyogg & Koch 2005). By acknowledging the importance of historical insights and analyses, the approach of this study extends engagements in HE scholarship to identify the interdependencies in the variabilities of 14 institutional change that Steinmo (2008) locates in the relationship across individuals, context and rules. By using the UFS as the local context for the historical analysis of how a HE establishment in South Africa responds to the unequivocal socio-political dynamics that surround it, this study demonstrates the importance of a detailed exploration of HE institutional change, and in context. It does not, however, mean that the UFS case is representative of the overall experiences of all HE establishments in South Africa. Instead, its unique historical circumstances, as unveiled in this study, ensure that the aspect of individuality in the analysis of institutional change in HE is not taken for granted. The UFS is thus considered as an individual case, acting in alignment with established SA HE institutional processes that can be traced in its historical socio-political contexts of change. This study thus locates the historical institutional premises at the UFS within the SA HE historical progression tied to the evolutions of the South African state itself. This study, therefore, demonstrates the importance of understanding the (dis)engagement with institutional change theoretical perspective in such a field as HE that cuts across the socio-political context, individuals and rules. 1.6 Research focus This study typifies Shapiro’s (2005) insights on studies in HE that consider the necessity of understanding it as a field that is closely knit in a symbiotic relationship with its societal context. In this regard, considering that societies are frequently in what Shapiro refers to as a ‘state of construction’ and are thus continually changing, higher education institutional frameworks also need to be examined based on their historical and contextual embeddedness within their continually changing societal realities. 15 The focused historical analytical engagement within SA HE for this study begins with the creation of the University of the Cape of Good Hope (UCGH) in 1873. The focus then zooms in on the UFS case example, with an eventual concentration on the institutional change insights from the 1990 to 2010 period. This approach offered the necessary space to understand the normative implications of historical processes on constituent institutional change aspects that relate to HE. Nonetheless, the use of historical approaches in this study duly upheld necessary precautions. These heeded Kay’s (2005) warning; where she notes that historical studies of change tend to locate themselves along with the premises of ‘path dependence’ in what turns out as an understanding of predetermination of future institutional processes. Besides its merits in understanding policy development over time, Kay notes that path dependence within historical approaches presents the following limitations: 1) an over-concentration on explaining stability rather than change; 2) the inability to point out decision-making over time, and 3) the confusion within the normative implications of historical processes that are in turn left unexplored. This study transcends the limitations identified by Kay (2015) by providing for an engagement that caters for analyses that draw patterns from the historical institutional build-up of state- level policies and their translation within the SA HE frame. The study, therefore, contributes to a focus on institutional change scholarship through considerations of HE change as a nexus of contexts; something that does not often receive its due scholarly focus. 1.7 Research problem Institutional theorists have, for a long time, been preoccupied with the task of explaining institutional change and stability in organisations, as Seo and Creed (2002) note. It is this kind of interest that prompted this study to venture into expanding the theoretical premises of institutional change into the dynamic field of HE studies. The rationale for this advancement lies in the consideration that the process of institutional change encompasses the ways that 16 societal functions can be understood to be structured and governed amidst the realities of a rapidly changing world (North 1990, 1993). The HE institutional framework, as noted from the emerging discussions in this study, is invariably tagged to the varied social-political contexts, which in turn determine the nature of rules and the way that individuals operate within HE establishments. Nevertheless, this link in the analysis of institutional change within HE has not often received sufficient attention, despite the constant charge on the role of HE in the changing local, national and global contexts. On the one hand, institutional change can be considered in terms of purposefully designed frameworks that are implemented in a centralized way. On the other hand, institutional change can present itself as resultant from a process in which new institutions periodically emerge, owing to the competition between new institutional forms and the already existing institutional frameworks (Kingston & Caballero, 2009). In his study, SA HE change processes have been examined within the understanding of institutional change theories in order to draw reasonable inferences about the intricacies of HE change processes from within the South African context. The historical transitions in the South African context provide for the exploration of change in HE in line with the way that Loomis and Rodriguez (2009) describe institutional change; as a supplantation of old models that is followed by the production of new ones. This study thus takes note of the historical institutionalists’ approach that considers individuals as decision-makers whose basis for their decisions factors in both the context and the available rules (Steinmo, 2008), and extends this form of reasoning about institutional change to studies in HE and change. This study, therefore, addresses an identifiable shortcoming of HE change research that limits itself to explorations of changes and continuities that focus on the coping mechanisms in respect to the changes in the HE environment (Benjamin et al., 1993) or in offering prescriptive 17 models for coping with this changing environment (Lindquist, 1978). However, Greif (2006) identifies institutions as devices of rules, beliefs, norms and organizations that invariably generate regularity of social behaviour. In this case, a theoretical consideration of institutional change as a premise of enquiry in higher education change, as conducted in this study, amounts to a significant expansion of this field. This study is a worthy undertaking as it provides for a way to consider the problematics of higher education from within the theoretical knowledge of what institutional change entails. Also, the historical analytical approach adopted in this study is even more pertinent within the example of the SA HE change processes, which have historically been in a constant state of transition through colonial, apartheid and democratic socio-political dispensations. As noted by Badat (2009), any adequate theorisation on Higher education institutional change processes in South Africa would need to undertake an overall analysis of the character of the social‐ structural, political, economic, social and ideological conditions of SA HE. It is noted here though that whereas Badat’s (2009) study focuses on post-1994 SA HE institutional change, he provides helpful insights on the kind of breadth required to study change in Higher education institutional frameworks. Nonetheless, the need to recognise HE change problematics within their deeper institutional and historical analytical frame as advanced in this study is not to understate Badat’s (2009) own acknowledgement of the co-existence of both continuities and change in post-apartheid SA HE. By drawing from the historical analysis of the institutionalisation of HE in South Africa, a connecting thread in establishing a fundamental premise of understanding HE institutional change that links the context, individual and rules, emerges. As such, the specific case of UFS can be conceptualized across dual identities as an organisation and institutional entity, while being both an agent and a structure in the way it relates to the institutional frame of HE in South Africa. This conceptualization is significant in 18 delimiting the place of individuals in theorising HE institutional change; whether such individuality manifests in the form of organisations or as human agents. The organisational and human agency differentiation in HE change studies have received fair coverage, particularly by Kezar (2001), who premiered studies on organisational change at the institutional level in the context of HE. Kezar argues that HE occupies a unique position where it ought to respond to its ever-changing environment. This study takes this argument further by considering HE as a constituent of the broader societal context within which it is located. The study thus advances institutional change theorisation as the more credible approach in understanding HE changes, rather than the organisational focus on isolated individual HE establishments. 1.8 Research Aim The primary aim of this study is to identify and analyse how institutional change theories help to understand SA HE change processes through a historical analysis of SA HE, and a case study of the UFS. 1.8.1 Research Question How can institutional change theories help us to understand SA HE change processes in the historical period of 1873 to 2010? 1.8.2 Subsidiary questions 1. What are the salient constituents of HE institutional change theories? 2. Which trajectories can be identified in academic studies and policy documents of SA HE as important in driving change between 1873 and 2010? 3. In emerging from its apartheid history, how did institutional change happen at the UFS between 1990 and 2010? 19 1.8.3 Research Objectives The primary objectives of the study are outlined as:  to analyse the salient constituents in international higher education institutional change theories;  to identify, through a historical analysis, the trajectories in academic studies and policy documents of SA HE as important in driving change from 1873 to 2010; and  to explore how change happened at the UFS in its emergence from the apartheid history between 1990 to 2010 1.9 Disciplinary location and the value of the study This study is located within the academic discipline of higher education studies (HES). It straddles between what Tight (2002) identified as the ‘system policy’ and the ‘institutional management’ subthemes of the discipline. As such, the study falls squarely within Bitzer and Wilkinson’s (2009) specific addendum to Tight’s categorisations of the discipline of higher education, in which they classify ‘Higher Education transformation in South Africa’ as a standalone sub-field of HES. The undertakings of this study, therefore, contribute to widening the scope of the nature and extent of studies in the field of HES by expanding its reach into engagement with how the theoretical tenets of institutional change can contribute to a frame of analysis for understanding change imperatives of the field. The undertaking of this study contributes to the emergence of a crosscutting scholarship in HE and change in which theories of institutional change are the premise of engagement. This study also fits within what Teichler (2000) considers as the need for research in HE to be self-reflective. In this study, the engagement with the institutional change requirements of higher education stands out as a contribution to this self-reflection on HE’s conditions that Teichler acknowledges as an imperative for the awareness that HE as a field needs in order to develop more convincing research work. 20 The approach adopted in this study is, therefore, not only beneficial for the expansion of the field of HES. It also presents a helpful frame of reference for institutional planners and other HE and institutional change-inclined researchers from diverse scholarly inclinations. Most importantly, this study brings on an additional set of perspectives for those who are directly involved with the precarious institutional framework of South African higher education. It provides an alternative perspective in the context of understanding HE change parameters that can also contribute immensely to the ongoing debate on how the SA HE institutional setup can transcend its colonial and apartheid legacies. 1.10 Chapter Summary This first chapter has set out the scene of this study as an undertaking for the understanding of how institutional theories of change apply to the HE context of change. The chapter contextualised the premise of this HE institutional change study within a historical analysis of the SA HE systemic change premises from 1873 to 2010. The chapter further introduced the UFS as an institutional establishment within SA HE that offers a localised perspective in the HE institutional change frame. The chapter, therefore, paid attention to the overall framing of HE as a multi-faceted field whose context, legal framework and agency dimensions need to be examined across multiple networks. As such, this chapter laid the groundwork for the contribution of this study to the expansion of the self-reflexive research undertakings within the field of HE, through an examination of its underlying institutional change theoretical premises in the SA HE context and the UFS case example. 21 CHAPTER II 2.0 ORGANISATIONAL AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE 2.1 Introduction This chapter conceptualises institutions and how institutionally based theories of change can apply to the study of change in the field of higher education (HE). The chapter unfolds by offering clarity on the varied dimensions and meanings of institutional frameworks, and how the conceptual premises of institutional change can support a systemic study of change in the disparate- yet institutionally driven- field of HE. As such, this chapter examines available literature on the institutional dynamics of formation, stability and change. It also examines the institutional power dynamics as expressed in the agency and structural dimensions of institutions. This chapter also provides an invaluable exploration of the intersection between institutional and organisational fields, particularly in the context of HE. 2.2 Defining institutional and organisational arrangements In order to engage with how institutional change theorization lends itself to change in HE, this study was grounded in a clear conceptual understanding of the premise of institutions and institutional change. Worth noting, however, is the range of connotations with which the ‘institution’ as a concept conjures in both academia and regular application. One also finds an apparent disjuncture in references to institutions, particularly in the overlapping inferences that relate to institutional premises and organisational setups. The diversity of debates concerning the relationship between institutions and organizations challenges whether their overlap constitutes an interplay that spells out a symbiotic relationship between them as North (1993) and Hodgson (2006) interrogate. Other debates are even more closely linked to the prevailing situation in the HE context, where references to HE institutions tend to conflate both the 22 physical establishments (such as universities) and the abstract dimensions (the systemic legal frame). Such an overlap is found in Jongbloed, Maassen and Neave (1999), whose study of change considers organisational adaptation in higher education as their primary premise and who admonish the overreliance on organisational theory in the majority of HE institutional scholarship. In understanding institutional and organisational arrangements, various debates are engaged in this literature review chapter in order to establish the necessary conceptual clarity for laying out this study’s institutional change theorisation premise, particularly as it relates to the HE field. 2.2.1. Institutions as social-rule systems In general, institutions are commonly referred to as humanly devised constraints that structure human interactions and impose form and consistency on human activities that reduce uncertainty through providing for ordered thought, expectation, and action (North, 1990; 1991; Hodgson, 2006). While endorsing this rule-based view of institutions, Hodgson cautions against simply categorising institutions as conglomerations of rules and constraints, particularly within the intense distinction with which North’s rule-based definition of institutions entails. Hodgson then argues that institutions ought to be understood as durable systems that do not only find credence in the social rules that structure social interactions but are also part and parcel of the same rules. In other words, much as institutions can be understood as rules, by the same measure, rules also ought to be understood as institutions (Greif and Kingston, 2011). In this way, institutions are not to only signposts for social interactions, but their embeddedness in the social-rule structures themselves also forms a part of those interactions. 23 Whilst working within the rule-based view of institutions, Ostrom (2005) developed a framework that considered rules across four hierarchical levels. He categorised institutional rules as follows: 1) operational rules that are used for day-to-day interactions; 2) collective- choice rules that rank higher than operational rules and are, as such, used to decide on operational rules; 3) constitutional rules that rank higher than collective choice rules and are the premise for choosing which constitutional rules apply; and 4) meta-constitutional rules which are rules that institutions fall back to in order to determine constitutional rules. These hierarchies of rule-systems within institutions indicate an intricately layered relationship within which institutional rules receive their credence; that is, institutional determinants can often be found outside the context of a given institutional arrangement. It is following from the identity of institutions within a hierarchical system of rules that Becker (2011) recognises institutions as meta-structures due to their socially deterministic nature. This insight needs to be understood in line with Hodgson’s (2006) earlier caution, where he maintains a similar argument as Aoki (2001) to emphasise that institutions are stable and shared systems of beliefs that govern expected behavioural patterns of the members of society. This idea considers that society is equipped to predictably respond to varied situations in an expected and accepted manner owing to its institutional make-up. The institutions as a rule-system perspective, therefore, provides for a way to consider rules as system-wide connections that enable societies to operate in generally predictable ways. 2.2.2. Institutions as regimes in equilibria Owing to institutions’ role in producing predictable and reliable behavioural patterns, they operate as embodiments of socially acceptable and collectively enforced expectations of the behaviour of various actors (Streeck and Thelen, 2005). For Greif and Kingston (2011), in their consideration of institutions as self-enforcing mechanisms, they note that rules are only as 24 significant as the behavioural patterns that they motivate. As a result, rules serve as crucial means of coordination that motivate people’s behaviour in what Grief and Kingston consider as institutions in equilibria. As such institutional premises occur as outcomes of purposefully designed rules in a collective- choice process in a way that Streeck and Thelen (2005) liken to regimes. They argue that like regimes, institutions are only legitimate to the extent of their enforcement by the society within which they are embedded. Likewise, Greif (2006) identifies institutions as devices of interrelated but distinct components of rules, beliefs and norms, which form the basis for society’s organization and invariably generate regularity of social behaviour. These attributes indicate that institutions and rules are not neutral, but rather, intended to accomplish specific purposes as perceived by those with the power and authority to institute them. Along this line of thought, it is also essential to take note of Bush’s (1987) description of institutions as a set of socially prescribed patterns of correlated behaviours, where society, by and large, is comprised of a set of various institutional systems. Here, institutional frameworks are considered to inhabit the space of interaction that exists between, on the one hand, the rule-makers who set and modify the rules, and on the other hand, the rule-takers, who comply with the rules as they exist. Streeck and Thelene (2005) emphasize the relevance in distinguishing between rule makers and rule-takers to understand how institutions evolve, regardless of whether the actors involved in this process change over time. In other words, rules can evolve to a point where the original rule-makers are no longer able to change them. At such a point, the lines between rule-makers and rule takers become blurry. Therefore, institutions may rely on actors with the ‘rulemaking’ mandate at a given time, enmeshed within an institutional structure that then often precedes such actors at a later time. Therefore, institutions can evolve to become the regime through which a given society operates, forming a cultural fabric of a social system that becomes part and parcel of the identity 25 of that system. Cultural fabrics often endure, even after the utility of the rules of the regime from which they emerged have ceased to be relevant. Hence, the two perspectives of institutions as rules and institutions as regimes are united by what Greif and Kingston (2011) consider as a functionalist perspective of institutional rules. They note that regardless of how institutional rules emerge, they remain in the service of the interests of their creators. This functionalist perspective, therefore, means that institutions as rules are deeply entrenched in the hands of individuals who have the authority to create and change them. The dynamics of institutional rules, though, play out differently depending on whether such authority is primarily centralised (formal) or decentralised (informal) within an institutional arrangement. 2.2.3 Institutional attributes: formal and informal institutional arrangements North (1990, 1991; 1993) defines institutions as human devices that constrain the structure of political, economic and social interaction. He also points explicitly to the different ways that institutional formations may manifest based on whether they are embedded in formal rules or informal constraints. This position gives rise to a critical insight into institutional arrangements, which operate within a continuum of formal and informal institutional attributes. The contrast between formal and informal institutional attributes was expounded by North (1990) who distinguished institutions based on the extent to which they are guided by centralised frameworks (formal institutions) or whether they are dependent on collective choice processes (informal institutions). He argues that the deliberately designed official laws and regulations constitute of formal institutions. In contrast, informal institutions find expression through norms and cultural transmission. Similarly, Stacey and Rittberger (2003) argue that formal institutional arrangements have their enforcement provided for by law, while Nelson and Winter (1997) consider that informal institutional arrangements are only enforceable 26 through social norms or organisational routine and memory. Therefore, while informal institutional arrangements have a framework of shared power distribution across the group members in a more egalitarian manner, formal institutions have authority vested in a specifically chosen subgroup that administers a form of central authority (Redmond, 2005). As such, North (1990) recognises that the evolution of rules and norms operate differently under formal and informal institutional expressions. On his part, Redmond (2005) elaborates on this difference by noting that for formal institutions, where provisions for change are explicit in the law, institutional change is more likely to take on an evolutionary path. In the cases where necessary legal provisions for change are not explicit in the internal provisions of the law, Redmond notes that revolutionary change is more likely, as the system will remain rigid until its overthrow. Similarly, Stacey and Rittberger (2003) consider that since the parties in informal institutions have no legal bound, they can only rely on political sanctions that carry negligible legal force. In contrast, the parties in formal institutions rely on established rules that can be enforceable by a third-party system (judicial body) in case of a breach. The aspect of a third party is an essential institutional dynamic to take note of, as such a party ought to possess the kind of authority that would allow for it to issue binding legal sanctions in case institutional breaches arise. Nonetheless, Streeck and Thelen (2005) note that institutions, regardless of their level of formality, are still bound by some form of sanction that regularly results into the expectation for a third (or other) party to step forth in case of breaches in institutional expectations. They thus argue that the expectation for interventions of third parties in institutional disputes is what separates institutions from other forms of societal arrangements. In most cases, therefore, both formality and informality operate side by side and North (1990) captures this relationship though his theory of institutional change. He argues that the changes 27 in formal rules also result in corresponding changes in informal rules, which then give rise to a new equilibrium position. For North, informal rules are thus extensions of formal rules and the change in the latter lends itself to a corresponding change in the former. Roland (2004) considers a contrary view. He notes that since informal rules are constantly changing, albeit slowly, they are capable of changing to the point when they are no longer compatible with the existing formal rules. In that case, Roland considers that formal rules tend to periodically cave into the need to fit within the changing informal constraints and will thus result in abrupt changes to account for this. Regardless of the origin of institutional change, however, Lowndes and Lempriere (2018) provide a reconciliatory position in this debate by noting that all institutional formations combine both formal rules and informal conventions. Moreover, as they argue, this determines why institutions operate the way that they do; where institutional structures and processes operate side by side with the established and routinized practices. Nonetheless, both formal and informal rules, along with the mechanisms of their enforcement form the core of the institutional structure within which agents operate (Greif & Kingston, 2011). This insight then sets us on another trail to understand how the dynamics of agency and those of structure operate within institutional arrangements 2.2.4 Institutional agency and structure Shepsle (2006) considers institutions as scripts that name the actors and their behavioural options. The options provide a prescribed sequence in which the actors make choices based on a wholesome expected outcome from all other actors’ choices as well. Shepsle premises institutional actors as the starting point for understanding the way that institutions operate. Mahoney and Thelen (2010) on their part, consider institutions as instruments of distribution that have a bearing on power distribution. This power distribution occurs within an interplay between institutional agency and structure. This interplay, however, presents a dilemma: on the one hand, there is an underlying expectation for the agency to conform to the structural 28 constraints within a given institutional field, and yet, on the other hand, such institutional structures owe their durability to the actions prompted by agents. In other words, actors are bound by the same structures which, as agents, they have an implicit responsibility to set up, maintain or even change. Nonetheless, regardless of each actors’ inclinations, their expected behaviour within institutional structures will tend to override their personal preferences (Streeck & Thelen, 2005), and this demonstrates the constraining nature of institutional structures. This impasse between agency and structure in institutional fields is what Greif and Laitin (2004) consider in their deliberations on institutions as primarily human-made and nonphysical elements that are, even so, exogenous to each individual, and yet at the same time, generate behavioural regularities. Before that, Knill and Lenschow (2001) had interrogated this impasse between structures and agency from the institutional formation standpoint. They pondered on whether institutional and normative structures provided relevant meaning in the formation of actors’ preferences, or if these structures only impacted on behaviour by providing a context for strategic action, without influencing human preferences. They resolved this contemplation on the structure and agency power-plays within institutions with a caution against scholarly undertakings that group institutional change literature within two oppositional demarcations of either structure-based or agency-based approaches. Here, it follows that different starting points for the explanation of institutional change can emerge, depending on the vantage point of a researcher; that is, whether structure-based or empirical-based frameworks are the researcher’s starting point. To their credit, Knill and Lenschow (2001) prioritise a complementary approach that links structure-based and agency-based analytical approaches. This study benefits from this perspective, as it relied on a historical analysis of change in SA HE with an exploration of structural components of institutional change along with agency-based motivations for change. 29 This position proved to be essential for this study, owing to the multiplicity of forces at play within the higher education field. It was also the most pragmatic standpoint for this study, considering that the institutional nature of the higher education field heavily relies on policy guidelines to spell out the institutional premises on which entities like universities operate, as noted by Redmond (2005). Besides, this interplay between agency and structure in deciphering institutional formation and change also extends to individual HE establishments. As such, these establishments, such as universities, manifest a dual personality: as actors within a wider HE structural frame and as separate structures, with the possibility of several other actors operating endogenously within them. This study’s vantage point thus allows for the acknowledgement of the expressions of both agency and structure within considerations for institutional change theorisation. As such, it is cognizant of the formation, endurance and change parameters that are at play within institutional arrangements and takes proper account of the mutual reinforcement across the power-plays in institutional agency and institutional structures. 2.2.5 Understanding institutional formation and stability in institutional arrangements. Redmond (2005) notes that just as there are variations in institutional arrangements based on the extent of the attributes of their formality, so are there different ways in which institutional formation, stability and change can manifest across these attributes. As such, Redmond links institutional formation, stability and change to a given system’s alignment with either the formal or informal institutional attributes. These positions are described in the write-up that follows. i) Institutional formation Lowndes and Lempriere (2018) define institutional formation as the process in which new “rules-in-use and their supporting narratives” are established (p.3). Their view of institutional 30 formation is such that it crosses over from the formalised space, where the rules ‘in use’ are the sum of the rules that actors apply (as opposed to just existing in a form), are created. By being ‘in-use’, rules allow for the development of narratives around them that in turn, enable them to become self-reinforcing. Redmond (2005) thu