Abstract
Universities are often portrayed as, and have been found to be, quite stable organizational forms where it is difficult to initiate and implement change. However, numerous empirical studies have also found that universities are undoubtedly changing both due to internal developments and external dynamics. The paper explores this seemingly contradictory development. It argues that organizational identity is a promising concept for researching both continuity and change in higher education institutions, and identifies and describes various uses of organizational identity within universities and colleges, demonstrating the relevance of the concept for understanding current dynamics within the higher education sector. In the conclusion, it is argued that more studies of the intangible aspects of higher education are needed to enable a better understanding of the factors fostering both inertia and change in the sector.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Albert, S. (1998). The definition and meta-definition of identity. In D. A. Whetten & P. C. Godfrey (Eds.), Identity in organizations. Building theory through conversations. London: Sage publications.
Albert, S., & Whetten, D. A. (1985). Organizational identity. Research in Organizational Behavior, 7(2), 263–295.
Alvesson, M., & Empson, L. (2008). The construction of organizational identity: Comparative case studies of consulting firms. Scandinavian Journal of Management, 24(1), 1–16.
Baldridge, J. (1971). Power and conflict in the university. New York: John Wiley.
Bauman, Z. (1996). From pilgrim to tourist—or a short history of identity. In S. Hall, P. du Gay (Eds.), Questions of cultural identity. London: Sage.
Birnbaum, R., & Shushok, F, Jr. (2001). The “crisis” crisis in higher education: Is that a wolf or a pussycat at the academy’s door? In P. G. Altbach, P. J. Gumport, & D. B. Johnstone (Eds.), In defense of American higher education. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Brint, S., & Karabel, J. (1991). Institutional origins and transformations: The case of American community colleges. In W. W. Powell & P. J. DiMaggio (Eds.), The new institutionalism in organizational analysis. London: University of Chicago Press.
Brown, T. J., Dacin, P. A., Pratt, M. G., & Whetten, D. A. (2006). Identity, intended image, construed image and reputation: An interdisciplinary framework and suggested terminology. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 34(2), 99–106.
Clark, B. R. (1970). The distinctive college. Chicago: Aldine.
Clark, B. R. (1972). The organizational saga in higher education. Administrative Science Quarterly, 17(2), 178–184.
Clark, B. R. (1998). Creating entrepreneurial universities: Organizational pathways of transformation. New York: International Assocation of Universities Press/Pergamon—Elsevier Science.
Cohen, M. D., & March, J. G. (1974). Leadership and ambiguity: The American college presidency. New York: McGraw Hill.
Czarniawska, B. (1997). Narrating the organization: Dramas of institutional identity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Czarniawska, B., & Wolff, R. (1998). Constructing new identities in established organizational fields. International Studies in Management & Organization, 28(1), 32–56.
Drori, I., & Honig, B. (2013). A process model of internal and external legitimacy. Organization Studies, 34(3), 345–376.
Dutton, J., & Dukerich, J. M. (1991). Keeping an eye in the mirror: Image and identity in organizational adaptation. Academy of Management Journal, 34(3), 517–554.
Elsbach, K. D., & Kramer, R. M. (1996). Member’s responses to organizational identity threats: Encountering and countering the Business Week rankings. Administrative Science Quarterly, 41, 442–476.
Etzkowitz, H., & Leydesdorff, L. (Eds.). (1997). Universities in the global economy: A triple helix of university-industry-government relations. London: Cassell Academic.
Fiol, C. M. (2002). Capitalizing on paradox: The role of language in transforming organizational identities. Organization Science, 13(6), 653–666.
Fiol, C. M., Hatch, M. J., & Golden-Biddle, K. (1998). Organizational culture and identity: What’s the difference anyway? In D. A. Whetten & P. C. Godfrey (Eds.), Identity in organizations. Building theory through conversations. London: Sage Publications.
Fumasoli, T., & Stensaker, B. (2013). Organizational studies in higher education: A reflection on historical themes and prospective trends. Higher Education Policy (forthcoming).
Gioia, D. A., & Chittipeddi, K. (1991). Sensemaking and sensegiving in stretegic change initiation. Strategic Management Journal, 12(3), 433–448.
Gioia, D. A., Patvardhan, S. D., Hamilton, A. L., & Corley, K. G. (2013). Organizational identity formation and change. Academy of Management Annals.
Gioia, D. A., Price, K. N., Hamilton, A. L., & Thomas, J. B. (2010). Forging an identity: An insider-outsider study of processes involved in the formation of organizational identity. Administrative Science Quarterly, 55(1), 1–46.
Gioia, D., Schultz, M., & Corley, K. G. (2000). Organizational identity, image and adaptive instability. Academy of Management Review, 25(1), 63–81.
Gioia, D. A., & Thomas, J. B. (1996). Identity, image and issue interpretation: Sensemaking during strategic change in academia. Administrative Science Quarterly, 41(2), 370–403.
Gioia, D. A., Thomas, J. B., Clark, S. M., & Chittipeddi, K. (1994). Symbolism and strategic change in academia—the dynamics of sensemaking and influence. Organizational Science, 5(2), 363–383.
Glynn, M. A. (2008). Beyond constraint: How institutions enable identities. In R. Greenwood, C. Oliver, R. Suddaby, & K. Sahlin (Eds.), The Sage handbook of organizational institutionalism (pp. 413–430). Los Angeles: Sage.
Golden-Biddle, K., & Rao, H. (1997). Breaches in the boardroom: Organizational identity and conflicts of commitment in a nonprofit organization. Organizational Science, 8(4), 593–611.
Greenwood, R., Raynard, M., Kodeih, F., Micelotta, E. R., & Lounsbury, M. (2011). Institutional complexity and organizational responses. The Academy of Management Annals, 5(1), 317–371.
Harris, M. J. (2011). Strategic planning in an international nongovernmental development organization: The creation of a meta-identity. Administration and Society, 43, 216–247.
Hartley, M., & Morphew, C. C. (2008). What’s being sold and to what end? A content analysis of college viewbooks. The Journal of Higher Education, 79(6), 671–691.
Hatch, M. J., & Schultz, M. (1997). Relations between organizational culture, identity and image. European Journal of Marketing, 31, 356–365.
Hatch, M. J., & Schultz, M. (2000a). The dynamics of organizational identity. Human Relations, 55(8), 989–1018.
Hatch, M. J., & Schultz, M. (2000b). Scaling the tower of babel: Relational differences between identity, image and culture in organizations. In M. Schultz, M. J. Hatch, & M. Holten Larsen (Eds.), The expressive organization. Linking identity, reputation and the corporate brand. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hazelkorn, E. (2011). Rankings and the reshaping of higher education. The battle for world-class excellence. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
He, H., & Brown, A. D. (2013). Organizational identity and organizational identification: A review of the literature and suggestions for further research. Group and Organization Management, 38(1), 3–35.
Henkel, M. (2000). Academic identities and policy change in higher education. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
Huisman, J. (Ed.). (2009). International perspectives on the governance of higher education: Alternative frameworks of coordination. London: Routledge.
Huisman, J., Norgård, J. D., Rasmussen, J. G., & Stensaker, B. (2002). ‘Alternative’ Universities Revisited—a study of the distinctiveness in universities established in the spirit of 1968. Tertiary Education and Management (TEAM), 8(4), 315–332.
Humphreys, M., & Brown, A. D. (2002). Narratives of organizational identity and identification: A case study of hegemony and resistence. Organizational Studies, 23(3), 421–447.
James, H., & Huisman, J. (2009). Missions statements in Wales: The impact of markets and policy on congruence between institutions. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 31(1), 23–35.
Kerr, C. (2001). The uses of the university. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Kirp, D. (2003). Shakespeare, Einstein, and the bottom line: The marketing of higher education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Labianca, G., Fairbank, J. F., Thomas, J. B., & Gioia, D. A. (2001). Emulation in academia: Balancing structure and identity. Organization Science, 12(3), 312–330.
Locke, W., Cummings, W. K., & Fisher, D. (Eds.). (2011). Changing governance and management in higher education. The perspectives of the academy. Dordrecht: Springer.
Maassen, P. (1996). Governmental steering and the academic culture. The intangibility of the human factor in Dutch and German universities. Utrecht: De Tijdstrom.
MacDonald, G. P. (2013). Theorizing university identity development: Multiple perspectives and common goals. Higher Education, 65, 153–166.
Mael, F., & Ashforth, B. E. (1992). Alumni and their alma mater: A partial test of the reformulated model of organizational identification. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 13(1), 103–123.
Marginson, S., & Considine, M. (2000). The entrepreneurial university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Morphew, C. C., & Hartley, M. (2006). Mission statements: A thematic analysis of rhetoric across institutional type. The Journal of Higher Education, 77(3), 456–471.
Pratt, M. G. (2012). Rethinking identity construction processes in organizations: Here questions to consider. In M. Schultz, S. Maguire, A. Langley, & H. Tsoukas (Eds.), Constructing organizational identity in and around organizations (pp. 21–49). New York: Oxford University Press.
Ramirez, F. O., & Christensen, T. (2013). The formalization of the university: Rules, roots and routes. Higher Education, 65(6), 695–708.
Schultz, M., Hatch, M. J., & Holten Larsen, M. (2000). The expressive organization. Linking identity, reputation and the corporate brand. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Shapin, S. (2012). The ivory tower: The history of a figure of speech and its cultural uses. British Journal for the History of Science, 45(1), 1–27.
Shattock, M. (2010). Managing successful universities. Maidenhead: SRHE/Open University Press.
Smerek, R. (2011). Sensemaking and sensegiving: an exploratory study of simultaneous ‘being’ and ‘Learning’ of new college and university presidents. Journal of Leadership and organizational Studies, 18(1), 80–94.
Stensaker, B. (2004). The transformation of organizational identities. Enschede: Cheps/University of Twente.
Stensaker, B. (2007). The relationship between branding and organizational change. Higher Education Management and Policy, 19(1), 13–29.
Stensaker, B., & Norgård, J. D. (2001). Innovation and Isomorphism: A case-study of university identity struggle 1969–1999. Higher Education, 42(4), 473–492.
Stensaker, B., Välimaa, J., & Sarrico, C. (Eds.). (2012). Managing reform in universities: The dynamics of culture, identity and organizational change. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Strati, A. (1998). Organizational symbolism as social construction: A perspective from the sociology of knowledge. Human Relations, 51, 1379–1402.
Välimaa, J. (1998). Culture and identity in higher education research. Higher Education, 36(1), 119–138.
Välimaa, J., & Ylijoki, O. H. (Eds.). (2008). Cultural perspectives on higher education. Dordrecht: Springer.
Washington, M., & Ventresca, M. J. (2004). How organizations change: The role of institutional support mechanisms in the incorporation of higher education visibility strategies. Organizational Science, 15(1), 82–97.
Watson, D. (2009). The question of morale: Searching for happiness and unhappiness in university life. Berkshire: Open University Press.
Weerts, D. J., Freed, G., & Morphew, C. C. (2014). Organizational identity in higher education: Conceptual and empirical perspectives. In M. B. Paulsen (Ed.), Higher education: Handbook of theory and research, 29, chapter six. Dordrecht: Springer.
Weick, K. (1976). Educational organizations as loosely coupled systems. Administrative Science Quarterly, 21(1), 1–19.
Weick, K. E. (1995). Sensemaking in organizations. London: Sage Publications.
Whetten, D. A. (2006). Albert and Whetten Revisited: Strengthening the concept of organizational identity. Journal of Management Inquiry, 15(2), 219–234.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Stensaker, B. Organizational identity as a concept for understanding university dynamics. High Educ 69, 103–115 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-014-9763-8
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-014-9763-8