A MEMORY OF ELEPHANTS ON THE MODERN CAMPUS 2

 The continuities amid the changes and the distinctiveness of the unfolding Australian canvas may be seen to result in

part from the ways by which structures or systems designed to meet needs at one stage have developed their own

conditions for persistence even when the initial reasons for establishment are no longer relevant or better technologies

have become available. With regard to the structural form of the Australian higher education landscape Glyn Davis has

observed that one institutional type persists:

“The concept of path dependency helps explain the consistent choices of Australian universities. Choices made

in the middle of the nineteenth century have endured, in part because universities did their job well, in part

because the direction of travel was reinforced over a century and a half by legislation, public expectations and

academic culture. The incentive to remain close to the original idea has proven compelling, defeating even

legislated initiatives to create diversity. As a result, Australian higher education is dominated by autonomous,

professional, comprehensive, secular, public and commuter universities sharing very similar missions (Davis,

2014).

He goes on to suggest that more market-oriented conditions may shape different structural choices by institutions. The

focus of this paper, however, is on another concern: the choices and determinations of policy makers. Path dependency

via past decisions both limits policy options for addressing contemporary problems and makes for a smoother transition

to new policy positions. A parallel question thereby arises: to what extent will market-driven practices in higher

education alter the established policy, regulatory and financing frameworks? Or, how responsive will the policy makers

be to change in environmental conditions and operating practices?

While we can identify broad starting points there are no apparent end-points of the three phases under consideration.

There are phase overlaps; aspects of the period of academic dominance persist today along with traditional academic

values, and statist influences remain in regulations and program funding arrangements, some of which have

encouraged more competitive behaviours on the part of higher education institutions while others are constraining if

not thwarting the fuller emergence of market mechanisms. A key point is that the three orientations co-exist and are

functioning concurrently in uncomfortable interaction with one another. Additionally they form the basis for advocacy

of quite different policy analyses and prescriptions.

Normative stances feature in much of the Australian debate, with issues and options presented in assertions of ‘what

we value and would like to see’ rather than assessments of ‘what we face’ (see for instance Encel, 1963; Bessant, 1992;

Myers, 2012). There has always been a normative strain in public policy making and advocacy, where values are

contested, but there is also a positive tradition that seeks to appreciate, estimate and weigh available evidence (Robert

& Zeckhauser, 2011). Importantly, while the value orientations represented in the three phases may be in conflict,

there are also differences in the representation of reality by various advocates whether of policy change, policy

continuity or policy reversal. That is, some advocates of particular regulatory and financing policy options are working

from assumptions about factors that have ceased to exist or have shifted from a major to a minor role. These factors

include: the composition of the student body; the structure of academic staffing and conditions of employment; the

structure of higher education supply; the nature of the student experience and modes of teaching, learning and

assessment; graduate destinations; the conduct of research; sources of finance; and community expectations. It may

well be that some advocates do not like what change has brought about but policy cannot be based on denial of reality

and nostalgic hope that vexed things will default to a benign ‘normal’; there needs to be some understanding of the

way things are now, where they have come from and how they may change in the future.