Abstract
Because the academic department is the foundational unit of U.S. universities, conflict in that setting is both theoretically and practically important. This analysis focuses on divisiveness in votes for promotion and tenure in departments at a large research university. The findings suggest that the departments most likely to experience very split voting patterns are those with larger instructional loads for faculty, low levels of internal curricular specialization, and "soft" disciplinary paradigms. The implications of these results for research and practice are discussed.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 503-529 |
| Number of pages | 27 |
| Journal | Research in Higher Education |
| Volume | 43 |
| Issue number | 5 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 2002 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This research was funded in part by a research grant to the first author from the Spencer Foundation. That support is gratefully acknowledged. The authors gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments of John Smart, Adrianna Kezar, and anonymous reviewers for this journal, as well as the research assistance of Janet M. Holdsworth.
Keywords
- Academic departments
- Conflict
- Faculty
- Tenure