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Universities’ efficiency and the socioeconomic characteristics of their environment — Evidence from an empirical analysis

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  • Agasisti, Tommaso
  • Egorov, Aleksei
  • Serebrennikov, Pavel

Abstract

This paper investigates how the efficiency of universities is affected by the characteristics of the territory in which they operate. The theoretical framework combines two perspectives: (1) the resource dependence theory, suggesting that the location of university can determine the amount of resources available to it; (2) institutional isomorphism, according to which the characteristics of other higher education institutions located in the same area may shape the university production function and the efficiency of its operations. In order to test this framework we use data on Russian universities and a non-parametric conditional order-m efficiency estimator with two categories of contextual variables. The first group includes the social, economic and cultural characteristics of the region where the university is located, while the second deal with the characteristics of other higher education institutions located in the same region. The main contribution of this paper is that it applies efficiency models that incorporate exogenous factors associated with a geographical area in context of higher education. Our findings highlight that the managerial efficiency of universities is strongly associated with the contextual factors of the environment in which they are embedded. Important policy implication of this result is that different public policies in higher education should treat particular universities differently depending on characteristics of context in which they operate.

Suggested Citation

  • Agasisti, Tommaso & Egorov, Aleksei & Serebrennikov, Pavel, 2023. "Universities’ efficiency and the socioeconomic characteristics of their environment — Evidence from an empirical analysis," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceps:v:85:y:2023:i:c:s0038012122002464
    DOI: 10.1016/j.seps.2022.101445
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Universities; Conditional efficiency; Order-m; DEA; Exogenous variables;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C44 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Operations Research; Statistical Decision Theory
    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions

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