THE DIFFUSION OF HIGHER EDUCATION BUDGETARY INNOVATIONS AMONG THE AMERICAN STATES
BEASLEY, JERRY LYNN; PHD
STANFORD UNIVERSITY, 1981
EDUCATION, HIGHER (0745)
This study concerns the nature of change in organizations. Two principal questions
were addressed:
What contributes to the apparent diffusion of innovations among the American
states? Where do leaders
get their ideas for change? Recent innovation studies have suffered from a common
set of maladies:
limited scope; focus on the labels of innovations with little concern for associated
behaviors and
elements; preoccupation with the characteristics of adopting organizations;
inattention to changes in
innovations over time; and insouciance to the impact of innovations after adoption.
In order to surmount
some of the difficulties stemming from one-method designs, several research
methods were employed
in the present study to collect separate sets of data relating to diffusion
issues. The first phase of the
research was an attempt to identify, by correlational analysis, significant
variables in the diffusion of
innovations. For this portion of the study, existing data were supplemented
by data gathered by a
questionnaire that was distributed to the chief executive officer of each state
governing and coordinating
board for higher education. The second phase of the study was a case analysis
of budgetary and
management innovations of the West Virginia Board of Regents for higher education
over a five-year
period, 1970-74, and the behavior of key actors before they came to West Virginia.
Documentary
evidence, written and oral, was the principal source of data for this phase,
supplemented by generally
unstructured interviews. Finally, in 1974, a random sample of faculty at four
state-supported institutions
(Marshall University, Parkersburg Community College, West Virginia State College,
and West Virginia
University) was asked to respond to a questionnaire that had been used in 1970
by the Stanford Project
on Academic Governance to survey a national sample of faculty. The principal
findings include the
following: (1) Poor states have adopted certain innovations as early as or earlier
than wealthy states. (2)
Pairs of innovations, which carry similar labels but are extant during overlapping
or different time periods,
diffuse differently. (3) States respond similarly to certain innovations initiated
at the federal level. (4)
Innovations within specific policy domains--education, welfare, civil rights--often
diffuse differently. (5)
Larger, wealthier states are often 'guinea pigs' for innovations that are later
adopted by the federal
government. (6) Later adopters may adopt only some of the elements associated
with a particular
innovation label. We can also make several statements about the innovative behavior
of governing and
coordinating boards and their leaders: (1) Statewide boards for higher education
in poor states can be
more 'innovative' than statewide boards in wealthy states. The statutory authority
of the board seems the
best explicator of differences, although coordinating board CEO's do differ
from governing board CEO's.
(2) Statutorily weak but wealthy statewide boards completed master plans before
strong but poor boards.
Instate, the weak boards are denigrated; out of state, they are venerated. (3)
State-level executives who
are professionally active outside their states are not more innovative than
their less active counterparts in
other states. (4) Although often unable to implement their own ideas, coordinating
board executives and
their staffs appear to provide the research and development function for governing
boards in other
states. (5) The creation of statewide boards and the adoption of budgetary innovations
appear to have a
quite modest impact on appropriation levels and allocation patterns. (6) Imminent
deadlines drive leaders
and counsultants to search personal memories of experience for favored solutions.
(7) The numerous
and grand expectations of statewide boards at the time of their creation may
partially account for their
instability and leadership turnover.
Social
Systems Simulation Group
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