Page 75 - Journal of Management Inquiry, July 2018

Abreu Pederzini 329

Now, the question remains, however, on how leaders lib- research grants to universities—among other types of fund-
erate themselves from the paradoxical position in which their ing. In addition, the number of students a university could
followers put them? In short, such a paradoxical position recruit was controlled by the government through quotas. In
might leave leaders desiring, wishing to fulfill their follow- the post-Browne Review system, students, by contrast, still
ers’ fantasies of control and power, while at the same time aided by public loans, pay up to £9,000 in tuition fees. Now,
leaders feeling frustrated that they are subjects of forces hence, the primordial fantasy is that of a quasi-free market of
galore too. To develop and particularly to emerge from a higher education. Therefore, the block grants from the gov-
paradox, Lewis (2000) suggests that “actors can avoid ernment have, especially on the teaching side, reduced drasti-
becoming stuck in these paralyzing and often vicious cycles cally (Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, 2011).
via greater cognitive and behavioral complexity” (p. 761). Furthermore, from the Browne Review onward, a process of
As fantasies represent precisely attempts at greater cognitive deregulating student numbers began, initially liberating the
complexity, they could be once more a vehicle for liberation. numbers of high achieving students—called AAB students in
In other words, the fantasy of the almighty leader that is in England—but eventually freeing everyone. In this context,
control emerges from followers’ desire to order the world. universities, faculty, and sometimes even students reinforced
Yet these efforts end up encapsulating leaders in magical the magical realist fantasy of leaders, as many of them cer-
realist symbolic orders, where the role that is bestowed on tainly hoped their leaders (e.g. university presidents) would
them is particularly tragic and impossible to fulfill. Hence, liberate them from such unamicable realities; when actually
now, I would like to argue that equivalently fantasies could university leaders were far from being able to fight against
be cognitive vehicles to liberate leaders too, specifically in these policies, and by contrast, were subjected by them too, as
this case, liberate them from their paradoxical position. Thus, the alternative, for example, to the hike in tuition fees, would
a way to cope with their paradoxical position might be for have been even more damaging funding cuts to universities’
leaders to construct their own magical realist fantasies, “to budgets. Thus, the paradoxical position exists in the used con-
bridge this gap between what is desired . . . and what is avail- text, which makes it a relevant context where to research this
able” or demanded from followers (Kligyte & Barrie, 2014, question.
p. 163). However, the question remains on which magical Finally, another important reason of why this context was
realist fantasies might liberate leaders from their paradoxical selected was that it provided generous access to its leaders,
position and how? so that their subjective experiences could be explored.
Semistructured interviews were carried, precisely, because
Research Design of the capacity of interviews to give us access—even if only
partially—to the subjectivity, and thus, fantasizing of inter-
Most likely, answers to the latter question are context depen- viewees. The semistructured mode of interviewing was
dent. Thus, the selection of an instrumental context was nec- selected because, although the purpose of the interviews was
essary in order to research this question. England’s higher the same for all of them (i.e., to isolate cognitive vehicles
education sector was selected as context, because it was con- that were behaving as fantasies), each person thinks and fan-
sidered enabling for the research question. In short, English tasizes in different ways.
higher education as a sector works, because there is a sym-
bolic order that defines connections among its actors. Data
However, such a symbolic order depends on things happening
in the macroenvironment where higher education is situated. Forty-seven semistructured interviews were completed,
In 2009, that macroenvironment was changing because of the including 24 university presidents (known in England as
global financial crisis, and thus, the government launched the vice-chancellors), 16 vice-presidents (or equivalent), plus
Browne Review, an independent higher education review seven background interviews with the most senior political
which through the response it evoked from the government, leaders involved in designing and/or implementing the recent
radically changed the way universities are funded (Department policy reforms. Interviews were done under very strict con-
for Business, Innovation and Skills, 2011), by following and ditions of anonymity and confidentiality. In total, approxi-
implementing pro-market policies. In other words, such pub- mately 65 hr of interviews were collected. In addition, a
lic policy changes came to disturb the English higher educa- documentary review was done before each interview, to col-
tion symbolic order, creating or transforming the relationships lect other sources (e.g. newspaper articles) where interview-
among its actors and the primordial fantasies that dictate how ees had recently shared their experiences dealing with all the
these interact. For instance, in the previous English higher recent post-Browne Review undergraduate funding reforms.
education system, because the primordial fantasy was that of Approximately 1,000 pages of these types of documents
free (or quasi-free) higher education, students only paid small were reviewed. Documents allowed me to triangulate some
loan-backed tuition fees in the range of £3,000, while in addi- information emerging from the interviews, and also to pre-
tion, the government provided generous block teaching and pare customized interviews.