CHANGE LEADERSHIP IN HIGHER EDUCATION: AN ACADEMIC AFFAIRS PERSPECTIVE ON FACULTY RESISTANCE AND COMMITMENT

Abstract

Higher education institutions must repeatedly change curricula, teaching practices, assessment systems, academic structures, and digital environments, yet their success depends on faculty members whose professional judgment and cooperation cannot be secured by administrative instruction alone. This conceptual review examines change leadership from an academic affairs perspective, with particular attention to faculty resistance and commitment to change. It synthesizes organizational change research and higher education studies to distinguish resistance from simple obstruction and commitment from passive compliance. Faculty resistance may express concerns about educational quality, academic identity, workload, fairness, competence, governance, resources, or trust; therefore, it should be diagnosed as information about the proposed change and its implementation context. Commitment is analyzed through affective, normative, and continuance forms, with affective commitment identified as the strongest foundation for discretionary effort, learning, and sustained implementation. The article proposes an academic affairs framework that connects purpose, shared governance, procedural and informational justice, workload and resource alignment, professional learning, distributed leadership, experimentation, evidence use, and institutionalization. It also outlines a phased leadership process from diagnosis and co-design through piloting, scaling, and renewal. The central argument is that academic affairs leaders should not seek to eliminate disagreement. Their task is to convert principled critique into better design, reduce avoidable sources of resistance, build collective efficacy, and create conditions in which faculty members can commit to change while preserving academic standards and professional responsibility.