Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon

As the reader will notice it has not been the most common way of doing research
which is reported about in this thesis. The research as reported about has been research
from a reflexive and as the case may be from a ‘personal’ point of view. Although
reflexive research already has a tradition of more than 30 years, this kind of
research often leads to intense debates about the demands for sound research.
To introduce and explain the reflexive research I have undertaken I will discuss different
topics in this chapter. Due to the ‘personal’ point of departure I will explain something
of the background of my work within the University of Applied Sciences I work
for (from now on abbreviated as UAS; see further 1.1). As an adviser to the board an
important duty of me is to develop and implement policy at an institutional level. In
my experience institutional policy is subjected to the demands of performativity, a
topic of which I better learned to understand the whereabouts during my research. I
will indicate how performativity came to be the main subject of my research (see 1.2). I
will do that by indicating what an on performativity oriented institutional policy
implies, and at the same time stipulate that even if performativity is taken seriously
the results of policy appear to be quite paradoxical. Next I will clarify why I came to do
research from a reflexive and/or ‘personal’ perspective on institutional policy. I will go
into the subject of insider research. The rise of insider research during the last 30 years
is related to discussions about the practical results of research within the field of
Organization and Management Studies (OMS). Shortly I will elaborate on these discussions
(see 1.3). Concerning insider research I will offer a first introduction of what it
means to do research from a complex responsive process perspective, being a specific
approach of insider research (see 1.4). A complex responsive process-approach evolved
in the last decade of the 20th century and is an approach of research which I came to
know during my research. To finish this chapter I will present a short overview of what
to expect from my research (see 1.5).
1.1 Personal, professional and societal background of my
research
For more than 30 years I work for the UAS in positions varying from lecturer, dean and
adviser to the board. If I have to believe the caricaturist way all UAS’s are framed in
Dutch public media I would say that I work for an immoral organization. UAS’s are
framed as having bad educational quality, committing financial fraud, lacking supervision
of students, and undertaking ill-considered and unsuccessful educational innovations
(Gendt and Ritzen, 2011). On top societal commotion stirs up about exorbitant
salaries, fraudulent declarations and megalomaniac plans (Berkeljon, 2012; Bommeljé,
2013; Cort, 2012; Giesen, 2010; Goossen, 2012; Heuvel, 2012; Pous, 2012; Willigenburg,
2011c). It seems that a lot of public money is spent on wrong things.
During all these 30 years the UAS is safeguarded against eye-catching derailments,
but as other UAS’s the UAS internally and externally is called to account for an assu-
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