In most post-industrial countries, a new university paradigm in higher education policy began to appear at the latest in the 1980s. Today, universities have to balance between two extremes: the traditional academic culture and the market culture. The old traditional models such as ‘collegial organisation’, ‘professional bureaucracy’, ‘organised anarchy’ or ‘loosely coupled organisation’ have been replaced by alternative perspectives and models such as ‘the corporate model of universities’, ‘the entrepreneurial model’, ‘the service model’ or ‘the McUniversity model’. Common to all of them is, however, the perception of universities as peculiar bottom-heavy organisations with weak organisational governance ( Clark 1998; Ritzer 2002; de Boer, Enders & Leisyte 2007, 29-30; Rinne & Koivula 2005; Rinne & Koivula 2009). An essential part of these trends has been the adopting of the principles and practises of New Public Management (ie. disaggregation, management drawn from private sector, hands-on management, enchnaced competition, concern for expect and measureable standards of performance) in steering, governing and management of the universities ( Deem 2001; Chandler, Barry & Clark 2003; Koivula & Rinne 2005). During the last 15-20 years, new trends towards marketization and NPM has been strengthened in Finnish higher education policy in several ways. The new university legislation that will come into effect in 2010 would seem to put the final seal on the idea of the NPM in Finnish universities. The purpose of the study is to analyse in which ways the new university policy, governance and management have affected the work of academics and other employees and how they experience the new modes of governance from the point of view of power mechanisms. The new policy is seen here as a shift from government to governance. This has meant adopting new modes of policy technologies: markets, managerialism and performativity (Ball 1998; 2003) which are carried out through new policy techniques: new salary system, quality management systems, annual work load system and time management system. Power is considered as a productive and discursive force which does not only control but also produces and determinates different things: actors positions, identities, resources and resistance (Heiskala 2001; Simola 2009).

The empirical (survey) data was gathered from the Universities of Turku and Joensuu in 2008 springs. The study group was comprised of “front line” academics (researchers and teachers) and administration staff at different levels. On-line survey method was applied. The questionnaire (likert- scale items as well as open-ended questions) was divided into 4 themes: 1) experiences of one´s own work and its changes 2) experiences of the effects of the new policy techniques 3) experiences and the conceptions concerning power relations, governance and management 4) the views of the existing higher education policy and its consequences. The questionnaire was sent to 2902 persons, of which 1256 responded. Thus, the response rate was 43.3%. When the response rates of various employee groups were analysed it was found that no single category was significantly under-represented.

On general level results indicate that the reception afforded the new policy and its practices has been at its least conflicting among the university staff in Finland. Especially the new salary system as well as the other new policy techniques did not really receive the approval of any group. This is understandable against the background of the Humboldtian cultural university, on which the Finnish university system has traditionally been based. An other central results was that the respondents’ experiences and attitudes were mainly dependent on their status on the hierarchy of work and power. Upper administrative personal identified more readily than the other groups (professors, teachers, assistants researches) with the values and principles of the new university policy. In the paper we will analyse the results more detailed by the background factors as follow: sex , work experience and professional status. The quantitative analysis is supported by the respondents´ writings.