Brokering the public-private dynamics of higher education through strategic alliances in an Australian 'hybrid' university

[Abstract]: Central Queensland University [CQU] students will not pay higher HECS fees next year after the CQU council yesterday bucked the nationwide trend and voted not to raise fees. CQU vice–chancellor Glenice Hancock said the council opted against following the 25% rises approved by southern universities, despite the revenue it would have raised. “It would have been an easy route to take during these difficult financial times and very justifiable in strictly economic terms,” she said. “But the council looked at all the pros and cons and decided not to increase.”….[B]oth Professor Hancock and CQU Chancellor Justice Stan Jones said the decision not to increase fees meant revenue and financial savings would have to be found elsewhere. (The Morning Bulletin, 6 March 2004) The significance of this statement lies not just in its appeasement of regional constituents in Central Queensland, Australia; but also in the not so subtle warning that, as a consequence of this decision, the institution will have to fill an expected short–fall in its funding base for domestic students. While specific details of Commonwealth government initiatives to reform the higher education sector are not as yet finalised, one particularly significant initiative is the publicly (i.e. government) controlled enrolment ‘balance’ among different fields of study. If institutions miscalculate their curriculum mix for publicly funded courses, then what does this mean for their ongoing curriculum development and resourcing of publicly funded courses and offerings entered into with private–provider partners? This paper reports on the beginnings of a research project analysing ‘stories from the inside’ of a higher education institution that could be described as one of the ‘hybrid’ universities (Marginson & McBurnie, 2003, p. 58) operating both locally and globally within the Asia-Pacific region. The question used to focus the study asks: What are the implications of these shifts in funding for the future governance of a local–global university that relies substantially for its economic survival on funds generated from networks and partnerships in the public–private higher education sector? Preliminary findings from the first stage of this project report discursively analysed data from aggregated statistics at the national level with individual and focus group interviews with participating lecturers. The themes emerging from these data are clustered around the infrastructure and implications of public-private relationships and alliances and of university governance in the early 21st century.