THE CRISIS OF ACADEMIC LEADERSHIP IN A CONTRADICTORY GOVERNANCE ECOSYSTEM: INSIGHTS FROM PUBLIC SECTOR UNIVERSITIES IN KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA, PAKISTAN

Abstract

Higher education institutions in Pakistan, particularly public sector universities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), are currently experiencing a profound crisis of governance, financial sustainability, and academic quality. This paper examines the evolving role of academic leadership within a contradictory governance ecosystem shaped by neoliberal policy reforms and entrenched bureaucratic traditions. Over the past two decades, donor-driven structural adjustment programs, most notably those associated with international financial institutions, have promoted a transition from a Weberian bureaucratic model of governance to New Public Management (NPM). These reforms have emphasized privatization, quantification of performance, and market-oriented management practices, while largely ignoring the public-good character of higher education in Pakistan’s socio-political context. This paper employs a qualitative, interpretive design grounded in reflective practitioner scholarship. Drawing on seven purposively selected in-depth interviews with senior academic leaders, the author’s twenty-five years of professional experience in Pakistan’s public higher education sector, semi-structured conversations with leaders in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and analysis of policy and regulatory documents, the study seeks analytical depth rather than statistical generalization, consistent with qualitative governance research (Flyvbjerg, 2006), this study argues that academic leadership has been increasingly reduced to managerial compliance rather than visionary, transformative leadership. University leaders are compelled to act as knowledge workers and administrators focused on metrics, revenue generation, and procedural accountability, rather than as intellectual leaders capable of articulating institutional vision, defending academic autonomy, and responding to local societal needs. This tension between neoliberal governance demands and the traditional public, welfare-oriented role of universities has produced what this paper conceptualizes as a crisis of academic leadership. The findings highlight how unrealistic policy expectations, financial dependency on external donors, and weak alignment between state structures and university governance frameworks undermine leadership agency and institutional resilience. The paper concludes by emphasizing the need for contextually grounded leadership models that reconcile global governance pressures with local realities, reaffirm higher education as a public good, and reposition academic leaders as agents of empowerment rather than instruments of neoliberal compliance.