Relationship between academic capitalism and quality in Chilean universities: A quantitative study

Academic capitalism configures itself from a set of answers that universities offer to the requirements of a more competitive environment, based in higher levels of marketing. Some essential aspects of academic capitalism in universities include entrepreneurialism, managerialism, income attainment, outsourcing of services, focus on-demand, resource management, and competition. This research analyzes the effect of such variables of academic capitalism on crediting years at universities. To do so, 46 of 55 Chilean universities (84% of them) answered a survey on the matter. The results indicate that academic capitalism explains 56,4% of variations in crediting years at the studied universities. Specifically, significant variables to explain individual institutional quality are managerialism (Test t = 2,595; p < 0,013), and attainment income (Test t = 4,628; p < 0,001). These findings are original and novel. They suggest that those universities that have been more permeated by academic capitalism have behaviors consistent with higher quality and reach better accreditation results.