Civil Service, Academic Tenure, and Management History: How Changes in Management Theory on Professional Knowledge and Hierarchy Affected Merit Reform

Abstract

This article relates shifts in American university tenure policies to historical changes in management debates on the relative importance of expertise and hierarchical standing in organizational decision making. The analysis contrasts the importance of expertise in Progressive Era (ca. 1895–1917) scientific management theories with the emergence of a more hierarchically grounded managerialist perspective in the second half of the twentieth century, and explores the implications for university policy.