Organizational Systematics: Toward a Classification Scheme for Postsecondary Institutions

McKelvey’s organizational systematics was incorporated to develop a classification scheme for postsecondary institutions based on organizational structure and process. Combining a phyletic approach based on history and current organizational theory and a phenetic approach through a national sample of institutions and multivariate analysis, a structural taxonomy was developed. Autonomy and centralization of decision making and participation and formalization of procedures were factors common to both approaches and resulted in a classification scheme with four institutional types.