From Henley to Harvard at Hyderabad? (Post and Neo-) Colonialism in Management Education in India

Abstract

Founded in 1956, the Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) was established with the objective of professionalizing management in post-colonial India through training, research, and consultancy. It was modeled on the Administrative Staff College at Henley-on-Thames (Henley), in the United Kingdom. Like Henley, ASCI used syndicates for its management training programs. Between 1958 and 1973, ASCI received more than $1.26 million from the Ford Foundation, part of which was used to finance the development and use of the case method in ASCI’s training programs, and later more widely in its research and consultancy. This article traces the ways by which the Ford Foundation––as adominating institution––stigmatized Henley and ASCI, their institutional practices, and the wider Indian society; and legitimized the case method pioneered at the Harvard Business School. Imbricated in the Cold War’s geo-politics, Ford Foundation’s interventions in Hyderabad should be understood as part of the emergence of the United States as the dominant neo-colonial power, which required the displacement of Britain, its institutions, and their practices as the template for India’s post-colonial management institutions.

U.S. Philanthropy’s Shaping of Management Education in the 20th Century: Toward a Periodization of History

“…Development-and we would argue management education too-became, therefore, the means by which the philanthropic foundations functioned to establish and consolidate USA's position at the helm of the neo-colonial global order (Kumar, 2019). Particularly congruent with this analysis is Cooke and Mills' (2008) onwards to gather economic data and promote "scientific" research to diagnose social and political unrest, enhance labour productivity, and capital formation (Bulmer & Bulmer, 1981;Harris et al, 1959: 566).…”

“…But there is overlap, too, in time and space, and we see the spatial dynamics of our periodization with the USA as a site from which management ideas and practices emanate -in our case, those related to management education. In denaturalizing this process, we follow others on the Americanization of management knowledge (e.g., Engwall, 2004, Kipping et al, 2004, and postcolonial histories of management (e.g., Kumar, 2019). Unique here is our focus on periodizing US foundations' philanthropic interventions in management-education-in-the-world.…”

“…As the post-War period continued, the Ford Foundation led the establishment of the management institutions in Third World countries like India and Brazil (Cooke & Alcadipani, 2015;Kumar, 2019;Srinivas, 2002Srinivas, , 2008. Collaborating with the government and private sector in India, it supported the training of doctoral students and faculty, faculty exchange, library and curricular development, and consultancy expertise (Hill, Hayes & Baumgartel, 1973).…”

“…Noting the colonizing influence of this and in a curious self-implication, Anderson (1987: wrote that "many of them have secured much of their own business education in the US and all of them have been surrounded by and bathed in US models," which had prevented the development of indigenous Brazilian management education. Similar to International Development, then, management education became another site and means of establishing the post-WWII, neo-colonial global order (Escobar, 1995;Kumar, 2019).…”

“…That is, we offer a "periodization" (Fear, 2014). In so doing, we contribute to established scholarship on Americanization of management and education (for e.g., Cooke & Alcadipani, 2015;Gemelli, 1998;Khurana, 2007;Kipping, Engwall & Üsdiken, 2008;Kumar, 2019;Üsdiken, 2004). The periodization we offer enables us to single out foundations' management education interventions as part of a broader mission to establish USA's geo-political place and power in the world.…”