Beyond Administration and Management of Higher Education: Re-emphasising the Identities of Statutory Officers (Professional Administrative Staff) in Maharashtra (India), Higher Education

摘要

This paper describes an observed study associated with the changing and evolving roles and identities of existing professional administrative staff (Statutory Officer) in Maharashtra (India) higher education. The study exemplifies that identity movements of professional administrative staff in higher education cannot be captured exclusively in terms of a shift from 'administration' to 'management' in the system of higher education i.e. a process of professionalization of higher education system. The idea about the 'fluidity of identity' is used to theorise the observed data, and in turn to develop a theoretical framework in higher education system that describes identities by means of three categories of bounded, cross-boundary, and unbounded professionals. This framework demonstrates that professional staff, who have better higher education qualification, are not only interpreting their given roles more actively, but that they are also moving laterally across functional and higher education institutional boundaries to create new professional higher education spaces, higher education knowledges, higher education relationships and better academic development than the officers who do not have any background of higher education. The roles or functions of the 'Statutory Officers' in different universities in Maharashtra, though governed by the same 'Maharashtra University Act-1994', varies from university to university. The roles (functions) and identities of professional administrative staff (Statutory Officers) are more complex and dynamic than higher education charts or work descriptions in the university set-up might suggest. It is suggested, therefore, that the roles or functions of all the 'Statutory Officers', who can now be called as 'professional management staff than 'statutory officers', from the university be well defined and that due weightage must be given to the 'higher education qualification' than any other factor for the better development of Higher Education in this part of the world.