Deliberative governance in higher education: the utility of John Dryzek's concept of meta-consensus

A rapprochement between managerialism and collegialism has become commonplace within policy discussion on governance within higher education. Processes of deliberation within university governance are suggested as one means of fostering this apparent accord. I suggest that Dryzek's notion of meta-consensus can assist processes of deliberative governance. The concept of meta-consensus describes how disparate discourses can be acknowledged and incorporated within deliberative governance. I illustrate how a process of deliberation characterised the nature of participatory and deliberative teaching policy development within a university through reference to case studies on accommodating student equity and diversity in teaching policy and practice and organisational structure and developing consensus between teaching staff on English language proficiency development in university students.