Monica Marquina, Graciela Gimenez, Wenceslao Rodríguez and Ignacio Mazzeo
The purpose of this paper is to study how quality assurance (QA) has impacted Argentina’s higher education system, how QA tasks are reflected on the organizational structure of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to study how quality assurance (QA) has impacted Argentina’s higher education system, how QA tasks are reflected on the organizational structure of institutions, which kind of professional profiles the new QA staff assume and to what extent university life is reconfigured from these changes.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw on data from three work fields: collection and analysis of institutional data; survey applied to a stratified sample of staff who perform QA functions; and in-depth interviews with institutional QA professionals. Results show that universities have created specific areas and developed new functions and roles in QA.
Findings
The authors have observed a growing presence of dedicated personnel trained in developing these functions, positioned further down a path that had formerly distanced academics from administrative and institutional decision-makers. Unlike European universities, no evident tension was found between traditional sectors and the new professionals.
Research limitations/implications
The limited number of responses of the quantitative data collection technique (survey) only allowed for a general and descriptive analysis. This limitation is compensated with two other methodological processes (documental analysis and in-depth interviews), that allowed to incorporate “type of university” as a variable analyse the data obtained.
Practical implications
Results can be useful for public policy to move toward new forms of monitoring internal institutional QA systems.
Originality/value
The research that supports this article aims at constructing our own categories to understand the same object that has been studied in developed countries, but in the Argentine-specific context.
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the effect of political instability on rural credit in Lima between 1835 and 1865. In particular, it explores the effects of wars on…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the effect of political instability on rural credit in Lima between 1835 and 1865. In particular, it explores the effects of wars on interest rates for the agricultural sector.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper relies on primary sources for the study of the early credit market of Lima. In particular, the study relies on a sample of more than 800 notarized loans for 1835–1865, collected from the National Archives of Peru, to determine the effect of wars on the cost of credit.
Findings
The evidence shows that wars increased interest rates on rural loans and that the impact of wars on the cost of credit was greater when the State lacked fiscal resources. Political instability made funding more costly for landlords and farmers, especially in the late 1830s and early 1840s.
Originality/value
This paper is one of the few historical studies on the role of wars on rural credit in Latin America. It contributes to our understanding of the linkages between political instability and financial development.