ABSTRACT
In recent years, the concept of design has gained increasing attention among administrators and faculty of public research universities in the United States. As these institutions aim to compete for resources, prestige and world-class status in science, they suggest to reformers a need to reconfigure the core academic organisation to expand the possibilities for generating and leveraging new knowledge. Accounts of design-driven change foreground the benefit of strong, directive administrative leadership. Yet, leadership occurs throughout multiple levels of universities where change unfolds in loosely coordinated segments and in relation to distinctive markets. This chapter focusses on the prospects of reconciling the concept and leadership strategies of design with dynamics of academic organisation. It applies the theory of academic capitalism to case-study data from four institutions, whose administrators and faculty have developed an array of STEM-centred organisational innovations (new centres, institutes, schools and departments) by which to advance the scientific research enterprise. Presented here are leadership strategies and perspectives of campus administrators, unit-level leaders and faculty. Results suggest why and how market competition between and within universities can stratify academic organisations and restrict the capacity to envisage and/or enact novel designs. Implications are discussed in the context of the United States and emerging global trends in this arena.
