The Transformation of University Institutional and Organizational Boundaries / Higher Education Research in the 21st Century (PDF)

An
emerging issue in higher education studies is that of boundaries crossing.
This is the main topic of the book "The transformation of University
institutional and organizational boundaries". Several signals of shifting
boundaries can be envisaged in higher education and research institutions
which could be glimpsed through organizations, the institutions and changes
to the academic profession. That of boundaries crossing in Higher Education
is a complex and heterogeneous issue, which characterizes scientific
knowledge today and represents a key issue when looking at University
transformations across contexts and policies, instruments and
practices.

The analysis of boundaries supplies interpretative frameworks for the
interactions between the development of professions and disciplines, as well
as the relationships of the science with various parts of society such as
state, professionals and the market. Fuelling further the discussion on HEIs
transformations allows capturing changes in the function, objectives and
scope of higher education and research institutions, the move beyond sectoral
and disciplinary boundaries and the increasingly blurred boundaries of
academic professions and of scientific work.
Public policies and HE reforms can push or impede the mentioned
transformations but they can also derive from individual likelihood of moving
in blurring spaces or from the transformations of the epistemic communities
and the emergence of new fields and sectors. Hence, changes are there, open
to our observations.