On The Changes Of University Institution In The Context Of Neo-liberalism

Neo-liberalism is the important climate which has guided economic social development of the western countries in the recent 30 years. Neo-liberalism highlights individual value and rights, limitation of government power, and the fully exertion of market mechanism. Neo-liberalism policy suggestions made the western countries out of the trouble of stagflation. As the adversary of Keynesianism, neo-liberalism demonstrated its special value in promoting economic development and public administration efficiency, which has exerted a profound influence on the western society.As the knowledge center of modern society, the university advances social progress, while it's also involved into the general structure of social development. Neo-liberalism is the ideology which dominates the economic social development nowadays, and it also impacts the university deeply. The changes in the university have broken through the existing university ideal, which indicates the university institution has also changed. The changes of university institution reflect the social need and development trend, independent of man's will.The changes of university institution in the western countries are imprinted with neo-liberalism evidently. From the changes of university institution in the USA, the UK and Japan, government was the direct pusher. Adopting the measures of cutting financial allocation and deregulation, government made market mechanism into the university. The change of source allocation affects the change of administration style, so the change of university institution is inevitable with the press of bearing more financial responsibility. In the aspect of institutional value, neo-liberalism management ideal rebuilt the academic-orientation management ideal, which made the university value from Mertonism professionalism to entrepreneurial professionalism; in the aspect of institutional norm, market mechanism was imbedded into the university institution, which became the dominant norm in resource allocation; in the aspect of institution organization, there're more changes, such as diversification of university interests subjects, centralization of university, reinforcement of president power, and bureaucratization of academic units. The history of university is composed by the inner logic and the outer press. The changes of university institution in the context of neo-liberalism, implied the conflict of two kinds of value logic. Neo-liberalism reform promoted efficiency of the university, while it also brought the dangers of commercialization of knowledge, entrepreneurial management and depravity of university spirit. Neo-liberalism suggested deregulation, and empowered the university more decision rights, forming the "decentralization" dimension; neo-liberalism accentuated market mechanism, and enhanced the management efficiency, forming the "marketization" dimension, "marketizaiton" advocates efficiency, and goes for profits, with utilitarianism as its value-orientation; the university is an academic organization with preference for academic freedom, which aspires after truth, oriented by higher education epistemology. "Decentralization" expands the decision rights of the university in exchange of taking on responsibility, but it made power centralized in the hierarchy of institution; the university is a bottom-heavy organization, whose value appeal is autonomy, and decentralization of power could protect the pluralism of the university and maintain the collegiate management to avoid the external interference."Marketization" and "decentralization" are the value orientations in the change of the western university institution, which is similar to the guiding ideology of the university institution reform in China. In the process from the planned economy system to market-based economy system, deregulation and introduction of market mechanism are also the basic trends of China's higher education reform. From the aspect of "decentralization", expanding the decision rights of the university is a measure to meet the need of the economic social reform, cope with the financial shortage, and enhance flexibility. In the reform of "decentralization", the university accepted the decision rights in a passive position, and there's no instruction for operating the decision rights. From the aspect of "marketization", government adopted "marketization" to shift the financial burden, oriented by the financial perspective reform. To expand the decision rights and promote efficiency, the reform oriented by "marketization" and "decentralization" is still the future development direction. In the following "decentralization" reform, the relationship between the university and government, the relationship between rights and responsibilities, and the relationship between decentralization and autonomy should be tackled well. In the following "marketization" reform, it needs to regulate government behavior, ensure the university as the independent corporate entity, decentralize the management power, and distinguish marketing measures and marketing purposes.To advance the reform of university institution, pluralism is the evitable choice to coordinate the conflict between the logic of the university institution and the outer value appeals. There's realistic reasonableness for neo-liberalism to place efficiency and responsibility on the change of university institution, so the university couldn't avoid the value appeal from the outer. Pluralism could offer dialogue place for the conflicting values, to avoid loss with accepting one value and refusing the other, which is the realistic choice to handle the conflict in the reform of university institution. It needs to deal with the relation between the university, the government and market properly, and make them in their places, which could create an excellent institutional environment for the university institution reform.