美国大学面对财政危机的人事对策:兼职教授与教授终身制

How Do American Universities Cope with Faculty Hiring When Facing Fiscal Crisis: Part Time Faculty and Tenure System

在州政府减少对高等教育拨款的情况下美国大学采取了开源和截流两种方式来缓解财政困境。本文以风险社会理论为框架，应用定量研究方法探讨了美国大学在应对经济困境和质量之间的矛盾时采用的教师选拔制度。研究发现，美国公立大学在过去的十年中(1999年至2008年)经历了学费、杂费和食宿费的迅速增长期，而这些增长很大程度上是以美国在校大学生债台高筑为代价的，过度开源使上大学难成为社会关注的焦点，公众和政府的压力迫使大学把焦点部分地转移到截流。美国大学财政截流的基本方式是在不严重影响质量的前提下，选用兼职教师代替全职教师。各大学特别是研究型大学，使用了相对严格的终身职提拔制和年终教师评审制以保障教师的质量，进而保障大学的质量。在风险社会中，美国大学所面临的困境是全球大学正在或即将面临的共同课题。希望美国大学人事截流又着力保障质量的实践为中国高等教育人事制度改革提供一种可能的借鉴。

When states reduce appropriations to high education， American universities take two methods to cope with the fiscal crisis: increasing revenue (including tuition， fee) and reducing spending on hiring faculty. By using Theory of Risk Society and quantitative methods， this paper explores how American universities deal with contradictions between fiscal difficulties and quality of universities. The research found that under the condition of ensuring basic quality， universities often employ part time rather than full time faculty. Relatively higher standards of tenure system and faculty annual review further ensure quality of teachers. The Problems that American universities face are the global problem， which other parts of the world are encountering now or will encounter in the future in a risk society. The author expects that the experiences of American universities in this regard will provide one of the lessons for China's reform in human resource management in higher education.