Quality‐management Systems and Dramaturgical Compliance

Abstract The implementation of quality‐management systems in New Zealand polytechnics is discussed. Although these institutions have sought to define quality in a way appropriate to a tertiary education provider, the introduction of a systems approach to quality has not necessarily led to the institutions meeting their objectives in terms of their quality definitions. Quality‐management is considered as an instrument of governmentality developed to ensure the surveillance of the work of academic staff in an educational institution. It is suggested that this surveillance has not led to an improvement in quality, or to institutional definitions of quality being realised; rather, that a dramaturgical compliance to the system has been achieved.