FOR 5234:  Multiple Competition in Higher Education. Internationalization and International Comparisons

• Subject Area: Social and Behavioural Sciences
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 447967785

Prior to the completion of the first phase, the research group generated important interim results on the three research questions that are central to each participating project and to the group as a whole. The questions are: how do actors position themselves in multiple competition? What internal and external dynamics does multiple competition unfold? What are the consequences of multiple competition with regard to changes at the level of actors and the overall system? Central findings and cross-project activities from the first project phase will be presented. In the second phase, the focus will be expanded to include questions of the internationalization of the German system and international comparisons. On the one hand, this involves fundamental questions about the scope of theoretical statements and empirical results on multiple competition; on the other hand, the work done so far in the sub-projects has led to more far-reaching questions that go beyond the previous research design and require an international focus. In this context, we divide the projects into the sub-fields "Internationalization" and "International Comparison." For the four projects in the sub-field "Internationalization," the research is guided by the assumption that there are developments that transcend the national framework at all relevant levels but that the national framework continues to be formative with regard to individual careers, organizational positioning and institutional configurations. Data collection in these sub-projects continues to take place primarily in Germany. In the six international comparative projects, questions of multiple competition in the face of different institutional configurations are to be addressed by contrasting similarities and differences with other national systems, and the specifics of the German case are to be captured even better than before. In these projects, the empirical data is collected in particular with reference to other national systems, which also includes data collection abroad. Both sub-fields will be analyzed in an encompassing way by covering actors in multiple competition on and between the levels of individual, scientific community, organization and state. As a result of the findings from the first phase, the state is added here as a fourth level. The focus on questions of positioning, dynamics and consequences of multiple competition is maintained, albeit now with a view to internationalization and international comparisons. The fruitful interdisciplinary collaboration between sociology and economics will be maintained as well. It is to be expected that the broadened international view will be of high relevance not only with regard to higher education and science studies but also with regard to higher education and science policy, which is increasingly to be located in an international or global frame of reference.

• DFG Programme: Research Units
• International Connection: Poland, USA

Projects

• Competitive governance and configurations of university governance - a qualitative meta-study (Applicant Frost, Jetta )
• Coordination Funds (Applicant Bünstorf, Guido )
• Disciplines in Competition: Disciplinarity in International Comparison (Applicant Meier, Frank )
• Dynamics of multiple competition of German universities from an international perspective (Applicants Cantner, Uwe ;  Grebel, Thomas )
• How Multiple Forms of Competition Shape Researchers and Scientific Production Within and Across Fields (Applicant Häussler, Carolin )
• International mobility as strategy and outcome in the national competition for excellence (Applicants Bünstorf, Guido ;  Otto, Ph.D., Anne )
• Multiple Competition from a Field Perspective: Structural Equivalence and its Consequences (Applicant Oberg, Achim )
• Multiple Competition in Research and Education. Comparing South Korea and the United States with the German Case (Applicants Bünstorf, Guido ;  Kosmützky, Anna )
• The Competitive Positioning of Universities and their Members in an International Comparative Perspective: Germany, the UK, and the US (Applicant Kosmützky, Anna )
• The Impact of Competitive Research Funding on Knowledge Production in Research Groups (Applicant Hottenrott, Hanna )
• Translating strangeness into strengths – International mobility in postdoc careers (Applicants Hamann, Julian ;  Serrano-Velarde, Kathia )
• Universities in multiple competition: changes in job advertisements for professorships, 1990 to 2020 (Applicant Walgenbach, Peter )

• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Guido Bünstorf