Desempeño investigador de las universidades iberoamericanas: Un análisis empírico a partir de la teoría de la agencia

The role played by universities, as a space of irradiation of intellectual life and knowledge generation in XXI century societies, is undeniable. Because of this, the topic of higher education constitutes a concern in all of Ibero-America, given that new forces and challenges are emerging: enrollment expansion, research relevance, the dilution of frontiers between the public and the private, and knowledge primacy. All these spaces have marked impact on university governance systems, and vice versa. In this paper, we turn to Agency Theory to analyze and detect university governance backgrounds or issues that may present a probable impact on research results in Ibero-American universities. In concrete, empirically speaking, causal relations between researchers' performance and three of the main variables of the agent-principal relationship are analyzed: information asymmetry, interests divergence and, compensation and incentive schemes. To achieve this, a sample of 854 surveys answered by university presidents and managers from 19 different countries was used. In general terms, practical analysis of research models and hypothesis show that agency theory assumptions explain the research performance of Ibero-American universities.